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IMPRIMATUR 

© IGN. F. HORSTMANN, 
Bishop of Cleveland. 
December 9th, 1896. 



ANSWER 



TO 



DIFFICULTIES 



OF 



THE BIBLE 



BY 



y 



REV. JOHN THEIN. 

Priest of the Cleveland Diocese; Author of "Christian Anthropology. 



" I say to you, that if these shall hold their peace, the stones will cry out." 

—Luke XIX, 40. 
"For the stone shall cry out of the wall; and the timber that is between 
the joints of the building shall answer. — Habacuc II, 11. 




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B. HERDER 
BOOKSELLER AND PUBLISHER 

NO. 17 SOUTH BROADWAY. ST. LOUIS. MO. 
1897 



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Copyright, 1896, 

by 

REV. JOHN THEIN. 



(^^iJxv > 



•^ 



PREFACE 



EACH century has its peculiar intellectual life, and 
divine Providence alwa3^s holds in reserve the 
proper nourishment. This nourishment especially con- 
sists in three things: In the faith, arms and study; 
these three form the Christian, the soldier and the 
savant. The one who prepares himself by the study 
to combat for his faith; the one who seeks the truth, 
not only to know it, to possess it, but also to propa- 
gate and defend it, can lay claim to these three titles. 
This was true at all times. Every Catholic, even 
moderately acquainted with the course of modern 
science, must be painfully aware that its professed 
relations to faith are simply hostile. Weapons are 
sought in every region of enquiry and speculation, 
with which to beat down revealed truth, or to assail 
its defenders. In our epoch error adorns itself with 
the most pompous and captivating names, with the 
cloak of science and thus enters our schools and 
workshops, in order to deny God and His revelation, 
the Church and her doctrine. Historical facts are 
misrepresented and used to calumniate God's Church 
and her most sacred institutions. Geology, Palae- 
ontology, Ethnology, Biblical Criticism, and above 
all, the new Science of Comparative Religion yield 
arguments that must be met, and difficulties that 
must be answered if w^e would save educated Catholics, 



IV PREP^ACE. 

perhaps from loss of faith, but certainly from painful 
perplexity of mind. Questions of faith and science are 
now in the forefront of our modern intellectual life. 
They confront us at every turn. To enable the Catho- 
lic to cope with them, the present work will furnish 
to him some weapons in a simple and condensed form, 
its scope is instructive, critical and apologetical. 

We do not claim any originality for the present 
work; its articles are culled from various authors. The 
works especially used in the composition of this book 
are: ''Dictionnaire Apologetique," by J. B. Jaugey; 
"Les Livres Saints et la Critique Rationalist," 5 vols, 
by Rev. F. Vigouroux; ''La Bible et les Deconvertes 
Modernes," 5 vols, idem; and Mgr. Meignand, '' Le 
monde et I'homme primitif." 

Since we wrote the work under the pressure of the 
various pastoral duties, no doubt some inaccuracies 
and omissions will be discovered, in regard to these 
we trust to find indulgence with the reader. 

THE AUTHOR. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 



PAGES 

CHAPTER I.— Rationalism, .......... 13-16 

CHAPTER II. — The Authenticity of the Pentateuch. — 
Moses is its Author — Proofs drawn: — i. From the 
Bible — 2. From the Samaritan Pentateuch — 3. From the 
Egyptian Monuments — 4. From the Language of the Pen- 
tateuch — 5. Arguments of Prescription or Possession — 
6. Answer to Objections, 17-33 

CHAPTER III.— Historical Objections Against the 
Authenticity of the Pentateuch. — i. Unity of Sanc- 
tuary — 2. The Sacrifices at the Hebrews — 3. Feasts of 
the Hebrews — 4. The Priests and Levites at the Hebrews 
— 5. The Endowment of the Clergy, 33-59 

CHAPTER IV.— The Different Names of God, . . . 59-63 

CHAPTER v.— The Fathers and the Mosaic Cos 
mogony. — I. Importance of the First Chapter of Genesis 
— 2. The Work of the Fathers — 3. The Fathers could 
not explain the Biblical Cosmogony without touching on 
Science — 4. In explaining human things the Fathers 
were deprived of Divine Revelation — 5. In Matters of 
Science the Fathers spoke as Private Doctors — 6. The 
Accessory becomes the Principal — 7. Neither the Patristic 
Tradition nor the Church has fixed the Scientific Sense of 
the First Chapter of Genesis — 8. Different Opinions on 
the First Chapter of Genesis — 9. The Results from this 
absence of Accord among the Fathers — 10. How far 
have we Deviated from Patristic Teaching — ii. We Ad- 
here to the Rules laid down by the Fathers — 12. Mean- 
ing of the Word Day and teaching of the Fathers — 
13. The explanations of the Fathers are completely in Ac- 
cord with modern Discoveries — 14. The Catholic Exe- 
gesis has never changed in Principle, .,,,,, 64-81 

(V) 



vi DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

PAGES 

CHAPTER VI. — The Hex^meron or the Six Genetic 
Days. — Four Principal Systems: The Literal System; 
System of Intervals; Ideal System; and the Concordistic 
System — I. Criticism of the Literal System — 2. Genesis 
abounds in figurative Expressions — 3. The Meaning of 
the Hebrew Word Yom — 4. Testimony of the sedimen- 
tary Grounds — 5. Microscopic remains in the Chalk and 
Limestone Formations — 6. The Coal Measures : — 7. Con- 
clusion — II. The System of Restitution or Intervals — i. 
Criticism of the System of Restitution — 2. This Theory is 
against Reason — 3. This Theory is opposed to the Bible 
— III. The Ideal System — i. Criticism of the Ideal Sys- 
tem — 2. Chaldean Cosmogony — 3. Accord between 
Geology and Sacred Scripture — 4. Objections refuted — 
5. Evidence of a Primitive Revelation — IV. The Concor- 
distic System — i. Criticism of the Concordistic System — 
2. The Cosmogonic Tradition of diverse Nations — 3. The 
Concordistic System establishes the most complete Ac- 
cord, 82-124 



CHAPTER VII.— The Hex/emeron or the Six Genetic 
Days — (Continued) I. — i. *' In the Beginning God created 
Heaven and Earth" — 2. Criticism of the First verse of 
Genesis — 3. Organization of the Elements of Matter — 4. 
And the Spirit of God moved over the Waters —II. — i. 
First Day's Work — 2. Objection — 3. The Meaning of 
the Words Evening and Morning — 4. Objection — 5. 
Second Day's Work — 6. Third Day's Work — 7. Fourth 
Day's Work — 8. Fifth Day's Work — 9. Objection — 10. 
Sixth Day's Work — li. Seventh Day — Conclusion,. . 125-161 



CHAPTER VIIL— Man From the Scientific Point of 
View. — I. The animal Origin of Man — i. Physical Dif- 
ference between Man and the Brute — Upright Position — 
2. Facial and Cerebral Formation — 3. Volume of the 
Brain — 4. Embryology — 5. Rudimentary Organs — 6. 
Intellectual Qualities — Speech — 7. Conscience — 8. Re- 
ligion — II. Has the Primitive Man been a Savage — III. 
Antiquity of Man — i. No Traces of Tertiary Man — 2. 
Kitchen Refuse, 161-188 



CHAPTER IX.— Chronology and the Principal Monu- 
ments. — I. Biblical Chronology — II. Chronology and 
the Principal Literary Monuments of Antiquity: — i. Of 
India — 2. Of China— 3. Of Egypt— 4. Of Chaldea and 
Assyria — 5. Conclusion, 189-208 



TABLE OF CONTENTS Vll 

PAGES 

CHAPTER X.— Unity of Mankind.— i. Biblical Account 

— 2. Science compelled to acknowledge a common Hu- 
manity — 3. Common Characteristics — 4. The various 
Races — 5. Other Differences — 6. Higher and Lower 
Races — 7. All Men are Social — 8. All the human Races 
are endowed with the Gift of Speech — 9. The various 
Languages — 10. Conclusion, . 209-216 

CHAPTER XL — The Earthly Paradise and Its Site, 216-219 

CHAPTER xn.— The Creation of Eve, 220-222 

CHAPTER XIIL— The Fall and Original Sin, . . . 222-226 

CHAPTER XIV.— The Patriarchal Religion or Primi- 
tive Monotheism, 226-231 

CHAPTER XV.— The Book of Exodus.— i. The Persecu- 
tion of the Hebrews in Egypt — 2. The Existence of the 
Tabernacle, .'.... 232-242 

CHAPTER XVI.— The Ten Plagues of Egypt.— Their 
miraculous Character — Examination of each of the Plagues 
and its Supernatural Character — i. The Water of the Nile 
turned into Blood — 2. Invasion of Frogs — 3. The Mus- 
quitos — 4. The Flies — 5 and 6. The Pest over both 
Animals and Men — 7. The great Hail — 8. Invasion of 
Locusts — 9. The Extreme Darkness — 10. Extermination 
of the First-born of the Egyptians, 242-249 

CHAPTER XVIL— The Crossing of the Red Sea.— i. 
The Hebrews did not pass along the Mediterranean Sea — 
2. They did not profit by a Low Sea, but, according to the 
Biblical Text, the event was Miraculous, 249-252 

CHAPTER XVIIL— Mythic System, 252-256 

CHAPTER XIX.— Cain, Cainites and Sethites, . . . 256-259 

CHAPTER XX.— Longevity of the First Men, . . . 259-262 

CHAPTER XXL— The Antediluvian Giants, .... 262-264 

CHAPTER XXIL— The Sons of God and the Daughters 

of Man, 264-267 

CHAPTER XXIIL— The Noachian Deluge.— i. Biblical 
Account — 2. Cuneiform Inscriptions — 3. Other Traditions 

— 4. The Question as to the Universality of the Deluge: 
As to the Earth — 5. As to the Animals — 6. As to Man- 
kind, 267-275 



Vlll DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

PAGES 

CHAPTER XXIV.— Ethnographic Table or Dispersion 
OF THE Nations. — Tableau of the distribution of the 
Primitive Peoples upon earth — It existed before Moses 

— Objections raised by the Rationalists and Solution, . 275-284 

CHAPTER XXV.— The Patriarch Abraham.— Objections 
raised against the History of Abraham: — i. Origin — 2. 
Abraham's Journey to Egypt — 3. Abraham's Victory over 
Chodorlahomor, 285-292 

CHAPTER XXVL— Sodom, the Origin of the Dead Sea 

AND Loth's Wife, 293-296 

CHAPTER XXVII.— The Patriarch Jacob and the Man- 
drakes OF Ruben. — i. Jacob buys Esau's birthright — 
2. The Blessing of Isaac — 3. Causes of Jacob's Voyage — 
4. The Sheep of Jacob and the Manner he obtained them 

— 5. The Mandrakes of Ruben, 296-306 

CHAPTER XXVIIL— The Patriarch Joseph.— i. The 
History of Joseph confirmed by scientific Discoveries —^ 2. 
Answer to Objections — 3. The Collar given to Joseph 
by the Pharaoh — 4. Divination by the Cup — 5. The 
Possession of all the Egyptian soil by the Pharaoh — 6. 
Answer to Objections made by the Rationalists against the 
Authenticity and Veracity of the History of Joseph, . . 306-315 

CHAPTER XXIX.— The Book of Josue and Galileo.— i. 
Antiquity of the Book of Josue — 2. Historic and Scientific 
Difficulties — 3. The Circumcision at Galgala — 4. The 
Conquest at Palestine — 5. The Miracle of Josue com- 
manding the sun to stand still and the Condemnation of 
Galileo, 315-335 

CHAPTER XXX. — Jephte and the Immolation of his 

Daughter, 335-337 

CHAPTER XXXI. — Gedeon and the Madianites, . . 338-341 

CHAPTER XXXII.— The Books of Kings.— i. Difficulties 
drawn from the Books of Samuel or ist and 2d Books of 
Kings — 2. Difficulties drawn from the Chronology of the 
3d and 4th Books of Kings — 3. King Josias and the High 
Priest Helcias, 341-358 

CHAPTER XXXIII.— The Paralipomenons.— i. The Cap- 
tivity of King Manasses — 2. The Annals of Assurbanipal 

— 3. The restoring of Manasses to the Throne, . . . 359-3^4 

CHAPTER XXXIV.— The Book of Tobias.— I. Difficulties 

— 2. Objections — 3. Anachronism — 4. The Demon 
Asmodeus, 364-371 



TABLE OF CONTENTS ix 

PAGES 

CHAPTER XXXV.— The Book of Judith.— i. Pretended 
historic and geographical Errors — 2. The site of Bethulia 

— 3. Historical Difficulties — 4. Assurbanipal, the Nabu- 
chodonosor of Judith — 5. Anachronisms — 6. Discourse 

of Achior — 7. The Heroine Judith, 371-3^3 

CHAPTER XXXVI.— The Book of Esther.— i. Esther, 
the wife of King Xerxes — 2. The delay of Aman's ven- 
geance — 3. The immense number of the Dead — 4. The 
Facts justified by History — 5. Living proofs of the reality 
of the History of Esther — 6. Additions in the Greek and 
Latin Bibles, 383-391 

CHAPTER XXXVII.— The Books of the Machabees.— 
Book I. : — I. Alexander the First that ruled over Greece 

— 2. The Division of Alexander's Kingdom among his 
Generals — 3. Judgment on the Romans — 4. Ties of Re- 
lationship between the Jews and Spartiates — Book II. : — 
I. Letters of the Jews of Jerusalem to those of Egypt — 2. 
The Sacred Fire — 3. The Ark hidden — 4. The Death 
of Antiochus — 5. Name of the Temple pillaged by Anti- 
ochus — 6. The Letter of the Jerusalem Jews — 7. The 
Martyrdom of the Seven Machabean Brothers — 8. The 
Letters of Antiochus V., Eupator and of Lysias — 9. The 
Anniversary of the Birth of Antiochus Epiphanes, . . 392-428 

CHAPTER XXXVIIL— The Psalms. — Objections: — i. 
Against the Origin — 2. Against the Doctrine of these 
Sacred Chants, 428-431 

CHAPTER XXXIX.— The Book of Proverbs, .... 432-434 

CHAPTER XL.— The Book of Ecclesiastes. — Objec- 
tions: — I. Epicurianism — 2. Scepticism — 3. Materialism 

— 4. Pessimism, 435-439 

CHAPTER XLI. — The Canticle of Canticles, . . . 439-441 

CHAPTER XLIL— The Book of Job.— Various Objec- 
tions: — I. The Probability of all the Details — 2. Pre- 
tended Contradictions — 3. The Friends of Job — 4. The 
Reality of the Epilogue — 5. Names of the Daughters of 
Job — 6. Authenticity of the divers parts of the Book of 
Job, 442-449 

CHAPTER XLIIL— The Prophet David. —i. The Holi- 
ness of the Life of David — 2. David merits the praises of 
Scripture — 3. Abisag, the Concubine of David — 4. David 
and the Prophecy of Nathan, 450-457 



X DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

CHAPTER XLIV.— The Prophet Isaias.— i. The Authen- 
ticity of Isaias — 2. First Objection: The Epoch of the 
Prophecy — 3. The Place of its Composition — 4. The 
Style of the Prophecy, 458-464 

CHAPTER XLV. — The Prophets Jeremias and Baruch. — 
I. The Prophecy against Babylon — 2. Letter of Jeremias 
to the Jews in Captivity — 3. Baruch, 465-472 

CHAPTER XLVL— The Prophecies of Ezechiel and the 
Vision of the Cherubim. — i. The Authenticity of the 
Prophecies of Ezechiel — 2. Objections — 3. The Eating 
of a Book — 4. The Cherubim of Ezechiel, 472-477 

CHAPTER XLVIL— The Prophet Daniel.— i. Authen- 
ticity of the Book of Daniel — 2. First Objection — 3. 
Musical Instruments — 4. Other Objections — 5. The 
Statue of Nabuchodonosor — 6. The Lions' Den — 7. 
Balthazar, King of Babylon — 8. The Canticle of the Three 
Children in the Fiery Furnace — 9. The History of 
Susanna — lo, Bel and the Dragon, 477-489 

CHAPTER XLVIIL— The Prophet Jonas.— i. Attacks 
against This Book — 2. These Objections are very Weak 

— 3. Jonas in the Whale's Belly, 489-493 

CHAPTER XLIX.— The Prophet Zacharias, .... 493-495 
CHAPTER L. — Authenticity OF the Gospels IN General, 495-499 

CHAPTER LI. — Authenticity of the Gospel According 
to St. Matthew^. — i. Formal Testimonies of Antiquity 

— 2. Indirect Testimonies — 3. Intrinsic Arguments, . 500-505 

CHAPTER LII. — Authenticity of the Gospel Accord- 
ing to St. Mark. — i. Formal Testimonies of Antiquity 

— 2. Indirect Testimonies — 3. Intrinsic Arguments, . 505-508 

CHAPTER LIII. — Authenticity of the Gospel Accord- 
ing to St. Luke. — i. Formal Testimonies of Antiquity 

— 2. Indirect Testimonies — 3. Extrinsic Arguments, . 508-51 1 

CHAPTER LIV.— Objections Against the Authenticity 

of the Three Synoptic Gospels, 511 516 

CHAPTER LV.— Authenticity of the Gospel Accord- 
ing TO St. John. — l. Intrinsic Arguments — Formal Tes- 
timonies of Antiquity — 2. Indirect Testimonies — 3. In- 
trinsic Arguments — 4. Objections of the Rationalists 
Against the Authenticity of the Gospel of St. John . . 517-528 



TABLE OF CONTENTS XI 

PAGES 

CHAPTER LVI. — Integrity of the Gospels. — Proofs for 
the Substantial Integrity — Passages Contested by the 
Critics, 529-537 

CHAPTER LVIL— Veracity of the Gospels.— Compe- 
tency of the Historians of the Facts they relate — Sin- 
cerity of their Relations — It was Impossible for them to 
deceive their Readers — Seal of Sincerity imprinted upon 
their Work — Objections: — i.' The Double Genealogy of 
Our Lord — 2. The Census of Quirinus — 3. The site of 
Emmaus — 4. The Name Joanna — 5. The flat Roofs — 
6. Christ's Public Life; The Portrayal of Jesus given by 
the Synoptics — 7. The Beginning of the public Ministry 
of Jesus — 8. Place of residence of the Holy Family — 
9. The Name Levi — 10. The Demoniacs of Gadara — ii. 
Another Pretended Contradiction — 12. The History of 
the Vocation of the Apostles — 13. Finally — 14. The 
Magi and the Flight into Egypt — 15. Conclusion, . . 537-567 

CHAPTER LVIIL — Demoniacs and Demoniacal Posses- 
sion. — The Word Demon — Demoniacal Possessions, . 568-579 

CHAPTER LIX.— The So-Called Brethren of Our 
Lord. — The Arguments of Helvidius and Answer — By 
what title the term Brother of Jesus is given to certain 
Evangelical Personages, 579-5^5 

CHAPTER LX.— The Acts of the Apostles.— Authen- 
ticity of the Acts — 2. Their Integrity — Their Veracity — 
Answers to pretended Errors, 5^5-595 

CHAPTER LXL— St. Paul's Epistle to the Galatians— 

I. The Cephas of the Epistle to the Galatians, .... 595-603 

CHAPTER LXIL— St. Paul's Epistles to the Thessa- 

lonians, 604-607 

CHAPTER LXIIL— Pastoral Epistles of St. Paul, . 608-614 

CHAPTER LXIV.— The Epistles of St. John, . . . 614-616 

CHAPTER LXV.— The Epistle of St. James, . . . 616-619 

CHAPTER LXVL— St. Paul's Epistle to the Hebrews, 620-625 

CHAPTER LXVIL— The Apocalypse, 626-628 



CHAPTER I. 



RATIONALISM. 

THE Sacred Scriptures have become in our time the 
point aimed at by infidelity. Against them the 
rationaUstic criticism directs all the weight of its efforts. 
Since the foundation of the Church, our Sacred Books 
have been mingled with all its wrestlings, but in a man- 
ner very different formerly from to-day. Formerly they 
were unanimously acknowledged as the word of God; 
after the extinction of paganism both heretics and 
orthodox accepted their authority and divine origin; 
they often disputed about the meaning one had to at- 
tach to the oracles which they contain, but never about 
the submission and obedience that are due to them; the 
soldiers of every camp pretended to enroll themselves 
under their banner and combat for their triumph. 
To-day, all is changed. Many heads bow down no lon- 
ger with respect before the divine pages; error does not 
accept the Bible as judge and umpire in the combats 
which it delivers to Christianity. Revolting reason or 
Rationalism, as they call it, has thrown off the yoke of 
faith. It believes no longer in revelation, it denies 
the inspiration of the Sacred Scriptures, the existence 
and possibility of miracles, and sometimes even the exis- 
tence of God. For Rationalism, the supernatural is only 
an illusion; the efficaciousness of prayer, a revery; grace, 
an idle fancy; heaven and hell, phantoms; nothing exists 

(13) 



14 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

except what falls under our senses, or, at least, does not 
surpass the bearing of our intelligence. Thus it lays 
violent hands on all the great Christian truths, and 
because all these truths are founded upon Scripture 
which teaches them to us, they attack the Scripture 
with a bhnd fury, without truce and without mercy, 
knowing very well that if they will succeed in over- 
throwing this column, the entire building of Jesus 
Christ would tumble with it, as the temple of the PhiUs- 
tines ruined by the force of Samson. 

Such is the origin of the war undertaken by the 
rationalistic criticism against both the Old and New 
Testament. Between the two antagonists, there is a 
deadly duel. If infidelity is right, the Bible is not what 
the Church believes; it is a purely human book, as the 
Iliad or Odyssey of the Greeks, as the Vedas or the 
Mahabharata of the Hindoos, not an inspired book of 
supernatural and divine origin. If, on the contrary, the 
Church is not deceived in adoring in the Scriptures the 
authentic word of the Holy Ghost, rationalism is an 
error, its principles are false, its conclusions inadmis- 
sible. 

Hence the efforts of infidel criticism against our 
revealed Books; hence also the necessity to oppose a 
dam to it. The numberless accusations launched 
against the Bible justify only too well the opportuneness 
of the present work. Since we are attacked, we have to 
defend ourselves. Since God has intrusted us to guard 
His Word, we have to keep this divine deposit intact. 
It is our duty, as well as our right and consolation. 

Certainly, we know, the most efficacious means to 
dispel the clouds which one gathers around our Sacred 
Books, is not to carry therein the flame of discussion. 



RATIONALISM. 1 5 

To those who calumniate the Ught of the sun, we only 
need to say : Look. To those who outrage the Gospel, 
we only need to say : Read. The Gospel, indeed, needs 
only to be read with simplicity of heart in order to en- 
lighten and touch the souls. Even those who have 
been gnawed by the worm of doubt cannot resist to the 
divine charm of the words of Jesus Christ, when they 
are upright enough to impose silence upon their preju- 
dices, and to listen only to this heavenly voice. Then 
they will experience wdiat Silvio Pellico experienced, 
after he had abandoned his errors: ''The Bible — thanks 
be to heaven, I now^ knew to read," — he relates to us in 
his Prisons, "the Bible was no longer for me as in the 
time when I judged it with the critical uprightness of 
Voltaire, turning into ridicule expressions which are 
ridiculous or false only in the eyes of ignorance or of bad 
faith, incapable to penetrate its sense. I saw clearly 
that, under many titles, it is the true code of holiness 
and therefore of truth; how little philosophical is that 
delicacy which becomes shocked at certain imperfec- 
tions of style, and which resembles the pride of those 
who despise all that has no elegant forms." 

Those who will read the Gospel with the same senti- 
ments as Silvio Pellico will admire therein, like he, the 
true code of holiness and truth, and the doctrine of its 
detract ers will then appear futile to them; they will be 
no longer dazzled by the dust one sees appear in the 
midst of the bright rays of the sun. 

The direct study of the Sacred Books, for those who 
are capable to do so, in conforming themselves to the 
rules wisely established by the Church, is the most effi- 
cacious means to triumph over the objections. But 
the honor of the Scriptures requires that we defend it 



1 6 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

against those who combat it, however unjust their at- 
tacks may be. It must be avenged for the outrages of 
its enemies. One must show to misled souls, who, with- 
out having ever opened it, insult it on the faith of 
authors of renown, how their guides are deceivers. One 
must also put into the hands of the champions of the 
Church the weapons with the help of which they can 
avenge the insults which they have attempted to inflict 
upon it. Therefore, this book is especially addressed 
to the instructed Christians, to both priests and laymen, 
desirous to render an account to themselves of their be- 
liefs, and also desirous to justify them against false accu- 
sations. But it is equally addressed to all men of good 
faith, friends or enemies, because truth is made for all 
upright souls. "Blessed," says the Lord, "are the clean 
of heart, for they shall see God." God will manifest 
Himself in His Scriptures to all those that shall seek 
Him with purity of heart and simphcity of intention. 
The scales will fall from their eyes as from those of the 
converted Paul, and there, where previously they beheld 
only shadows and spots, they will perceive only radiant 
truths, worthy of their belief and adoration. 



CHAPTER II. 



THE AUTHENTICITT OF THE PENTATEUCH. 

THE word Pentateuch signifies a work embracing 
five books. It is the collective name which we 
give to the first five books of the Bible, that is, Genesis, 
Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. 

Moses is at once a historic personage and a historian. 
He is a historic personage, because he directed the ex- 
odus of the Hebrews, gave to them a legislation, and 
led them until to the gates of Palestine; he is a histor- 
ian, because he has related the history of his people 
since the beginning of the world, and because he has 
insisted quite particularly upon his own history: he is 
the author of the Pentateuch. \ Now, the rationalistic 
criticism makes efforts in our days, with a real madness, 
to make Moses disappear as a historian, and even as a 
historic personage; it feels that, if it succeeds in this 
task, it would destroy the character of the rehgion of 
Israel, and consequently it would deal a great blow to 
Christianity, for on account of the intimate connection 
that exists between Christianity and the religion which 
was destined to prepare its coming, every attack, either 
against the supernatural character of this religion, or 
even against the traditional history of the people chosen 
by God, falls back on the religion of Jesus Christ. 
Therefore, it is more important to-day than ever, to es- 
tablish solidly these two beliefs of tradition: Moses is 
D. B.— 2 (17) 



1 8 DIFFICULTIES OF TliE BIBLE. 

the legislator of the Hebrews; Moses is the historian of 
the people of God, and the author of the Pentateuch. 
There is between these two assertions an intimate bond, 
although not necessary: an intimate bond, for when 
Moses is the historian, one cannot deny that he is the 
legislator; a not necessary bond, for if Moses were not 
the historian, it would not necessarily follow from this 
that he was not the legislator. Therefore, there are 
two distinct questions, that of Moses as legislator, and 
that of Moses as historian. 

I. Moses as Legislator. 

Both the Jewish and Christian tradition has always 
presented to us Moses as the legislator of the Hebrew 
people, and as the author of the book which contains 
this law, that is, of the Pentateuch. The rationalists un- 
derstanding very well the whole importance of this 
truth from the- point of view of Christianity, have at first 
tried to rob Moses of the composition of the Pentateuch, 
as we shall see further on. Then, emboldened by their 
audacity, they went further and have refused to Moses, 
not only the historical authorship, but even the promul- 
gation of the law. According to the rationalistic school, 
Moses would not be even the author of the most of the 
laws which carry his name. Perliaps he is the author 
of the Decalogue and of some rare laws promulgated 
in the same epoch as that fundamental rule of religion 
and morals. Not even this is certain according to the 
modern doctors, but which, according to them, is out- 
side of dispute, is that Moses is neither the author of 
the ritual laws of Leviticus nor of Deuteronomy. What 
they affirm is, that the legislation of the Pentateuch, 
attrilnited to Moses, is in great part posterior to him. 



THE AUTHENTICITY OF THE PENTATEUCH. 1 9 

How do the rationalists explain the formation of this 
law? Their hypotheses in regard to this subject are ex- 
posed and refuted in various chapters of this work; what 
is sufficient to keep in mind here, is the affirmation that 
Moses is not the legislator of the Hebrews: an affirma- 
tion completely erroneous and given the lie to, not only 
by faith, but also by science, as we are going to see. 

1. In the first place, the authenticity of the Penta- 
teuch, in considering it in its Igislative portion as weh 
as in its dogmatic portion, we shall prove in the second 
part of this chapter. When, therefore, Moses has drawn 
up these laws, it is naturally impossible to pretend that 
they are posterior to him. 

2. But, in making abstraction of the authenticity of 
the Pentateuch, in supposing even, if you wish, that 
this authenticity is not proved, the role of Moses as 
legislator of the Hebrews is thereby not less established 
upon incontestable proofs. And indeed, the ration- 
alists do not make the attempt, we beUeve, to deny the 
fact, that in the epoch of the captivity the Hebrew peo- 
ple was universally persuaded that Moses was its legisla- 
tor. Rigorously taken, this would be sufficient for us, 
for there is not question here, as in the question of the 
authenticity of the Pentateuch, of a literary fact so to 
say: there is question of a social fact, of an extreme sim- 
plicity as well as of a capital importance. Now, the 
existence of a general belief of a people upon a point of 
this kind, at a given moment, can be explained only — 
at least by convincing proofs of the contrary — by the 
antiquity of this belief and by the veracity of the fact in 
question. As a brilliant apologist has correctly re- 
marked, "If tradition were not admitted as a proof of a 
similar fact, entire history would fall to pieces." 



20 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

3. But when one cannot deny that Moses has been 
the legislator of the Hebrews, one pretends that his role 
has not been so extensive as the Pentateuch makes us 
suppose, that the ritual laws in particular are not de- 
rived from him, and date only from the time of Esdras. 
To this we answer: i. How could one make us believe 
that the contemporaries of Esdras, instructed as all the 
peoples upon their history, permitted themselves to be 
imposed upon, and to believe that laws, which were un- 
known until the captivity, came from Moses; and espe- 
cialty when these laws were, as the rationalists claim, in 
contradiction with the history of the IsraeHtes; when 
they imposed upon them one single sanctuary, sacrificial 
rites, and even a sacredotal caste unknown until then? 
A certain rationalist treats the Hebrews as horned 
brains; indeed, one must regard the Hebrews as stupid 
beings, when one supposes that they, on the invitation 
of Esdras, and by admitting as Mosaic a new legislation, 
have consented to see in their whole history the con- 
trary of what they had seen thus far. 2. Besides, we have 
the right to invoke here the argument of Possession. 
VV^e possess the ritual laws, about the unity of the sanc- 
tuary, about the Levitical priesthood, etc., as emanating 
from Moses; now possession is equal to a title, and to 
rob us of this, our adversaries will be obliged to prove, 
not only that the things might have passed as they say, 
but that they could not pass otherwise. Now, do they 
prove this? Far from this, for their hypotheses have 
not even the merit of probability, as we remarked before, 
and as one can easily convince himself by reading 
the next chapter in regard to the Sanctuary, Priest- 
hood, etc. 

Thus, it can be seen, that even by clinging to the 



THE AUTHENTICITY OF THE PENTATEUCH. 21 

scientific point of view, one is not authorized to deny 
tradition which beholds in Moses the author of the 
Hebrew legislation. As to the dogmatic point of view, 
we have to make a remark in ending. As we have said 
elsewhere, when the authenticity of the Pentateuch 
was a point regarded by the theologians as semi-dog- 
matic, certain Christians beUeved that they could make 
some concessions in regard to this subject. We do not 
pretend here to judge this tendency but we will re- 
mark that the question of Moses-legislator presents 
itself with a character more strictly dogmatic than that 
of Moses-historian. How could a Catholic refuse to 
Moses the laws of the Pentateuch, when the official title 
under which all the laws, the civil as well as the moral 
or ceremonial laws, is this: "God said to Moses: Thou 
shalt speak thus to the children of Israel?" The 
Christian who believes in the inspiration of the Bible 
cannot suppose that the Sacred Books attribute to 
Moses laws which are not derived from him; to suppose 
this would be attacking the very origin of these laws, 
not only their Mosaic origin, but also their divine 
origin; this would be supposing that the inspired 
authors from whom these laws are derived had made an 
abuse of the belief of the Hebrews, at the authority of 
Moses, to impose upon them, in the name of God, pain- 
ful and very heavy laws. From that time one would 
fmd himself in the following dilemma: either these 
laws are divine, and then it is a peculiar mark of respect 
towards the divine law to introduce fraud at its promul- 
gations; or these laws are human, and then one supposes 
that the Bible, in giving them as divine, has committed 
an error upon a dogmatic point. Hence, we must 
conclude that the thesis in question belongs to faith. 



22 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

II. Moses as Historian. 

In the first place, what is the degree of dogmatic 
certitude of the assertion: The Pentateuch is from 
Moses? Theology which allows generally a great lib- 
erty to the discussions in regard to the human authen- 
ticity of the Sacred Books, and ordinarily contents itself 
to require that one respects their canonicity and their 
inspiration, shows itself more rigorous in regard to the 
books of Moses, and the most of the theologians con- 
sider tradition which refers to this prophet the entire 
composition of the works that are attributed to him, as 
having a semi-dogmatic character, and do not believe 
it permitted to remove from this. The Church, how- 
ever, has not pronounced herself officially upon this 
question, and the exact limit which orthodoxy allows 
upon this point does not seem, as long as the Church 
has not spoken, that it can be traced with a complete 
certitude. Certain Catholics, exaggerating perhaps 
the liberty which the Church permits, in this point, to 
her children, show, since some years, a pronounced ten- 
dency to break with the traditional thesis which sees 
in Moses the author of the Pentateuch considered, 
either in its ensemble, or in each of its parts. Always 
believing in Moses-legislator, a point which we consider 
as dogmatic, as we have seen, they tend, it seems, to 
suppress or to diminish, at least in part, the role of 
Moses-historian, in spite of the intimacy of this point 
with the first. We will not follow them upon this 
ground, and, without inquiring whether this point be- 
longs to Catholic belief, what we maintain here, is the 
traditional thesis: the Pentateuch, taken in its ensem- 
ble, is tlie work of Moses. This thesis, we shall prove 



THE AUTHENTICITY OF THE PENTATEUCH. 23 

successively by the Bible itself, by the Samaritan Penta- 
teuch, by the language of the Pentateuch, by the Egyp- 
tian monuments, and finally by the argument of posses- 
sion, and then we shall examine the objections opposed 
by the rationalists to the authenticity of the Penta- 
teuch. 

I. The whole Bible testifies in favor of the mosaic 
origin of the Pentateuch: — i. The Pentateuch itself 
must contain, as all the books, certain allusions by 
means of which it is possible to designate its author. 
Now these allusions are really found therein, and the 
one which they designate is Moses. For the legislative 
portion^ there cannot be any doubt. About this point 
the very text of the Pentateuch is formal. It affirms 
that the laws have been revealed by God to Moses him- 
self, and promulgated by this prophet to the people of 
Israel. The legislative formula constantly repeated, 
the official title under which are inscribed all the laws, 
the civil as well as the moral or ceremonial laws, is this: 
*'God said to Moses: Thou shalt speak thus to the child- 
ren of Israel." On the other hand, it is said (Ex. xxiv, 
4; Deut. xxxi, 9) that the law was not only promul- 
gated aloud, but also written by Moses. As to the 
historic portion, several passages equally suppose its 
historic origin. In Exodus (xvii, 14), for instance, God 
commands Moses to write, not in a book, but in the 
Book, according to the Hebrew text, the account of the 
battle against Amalecites, which supposes the existence 
of a book concerning the history of Israel. The same 
reflection is introduced by Num. xxxiii, 1-2, etc. 2. 
All the other books of the Old Testament confirm the 
Mosaic origin of the Pentateuch, for all make allusion 
to it, all presuppose it, either in the events which are 



24 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

related therein, or in the laws which are contained 
therein. Josue could not be understood without the 
Pentateuch, and besides he names several times the 
book of the law (I. 7, 8, etc.). The Judges suppose it, 
either at their first appearance, by recaUing to mind 
the order contained in the Pentateuch to exterminate 
the Chanaanites, or in the discourse of the angel (II, 1-3), 
which reproduces passages from Exodus (xxiv, 12), 
from Deuteronomy (vii, 2), etc. In I and II of Kings, 
we see God honored in the tabernacle according to the 
Mosaic law, and a passage of Deuteronomy (xiii, 3) re- 
produces word for word I Kings, ii, 13. Beginning 
with III Kings all the historical books make mention 
of the Pentateuch, and history itself supposes it forcibly. 
And indeed what do we see therein? a people carried 
by its taste to idolatry, and falling therein frequently: 
why therefore does it always leave this, after having 
fallen therein? because its law is monotheistic, because 
it has the Decalogue and the Mosaic legislation. Sup- 
press these, and you understand nothing in the history 
of this people; admit for a moment the absence of the 
Mosaic law at the outset of the history of the Hebrew 
people, and you will ask yourselves how it comes that 
a people carried invincibly, so to say, towards idolatry 
could end in making for itself a law in complete contra- 
diction with its tastes and inclinations. The history 
of the Plebrews supposes the Mosaic law as a stone as- 
cending towards heaven, in spite of the force that at- 
tracts it downward; it supposes a foreign force which 
has impressed upon it this movement. When finally 
we run over the Psalms, the Books of Wisdom and the 
Prophets, we again arrive at the same conclusion: they 
all suppose the Pentateuch; they are its echo; they 



THE AUTHENTICITY OF THE PENTATEUCH. • 25 

quote it sometimes word for word, thus proving not 
only that the facts related by the Pentateuch were 
known to the Hebrews, but also that this book itself 
was known and employed by them. 3. As to the new. 
Testament, wdiat stronger words can one desire than 
the words of our Saviour addressed to the Jews: ''If 
you did believe Moses, you would perhaps believe me 
also, for he wrote of me; but if you do not believe his 
writings, how will you believe my words?" (John v, 46.) 
Elsewhere we see the Messiah interpreting to the two 
disciples of Emmaus, all the prophetic writings in re- 
gard to Him, beginning with Moses (Luke xxiv, 27), 
etc. The New Testament is therefore fully in accord 
with the Old to tell that Moses has written, and that 
his book has always been religiously guarded by the 
Hebrew people. 

2. The high antiquity, if not the mosaism of the Pen- 
tateuch, is confirmed by the existence of the Samaritan 
Pentateuch. This is a Pentateuch written in Hebrew, 
but with the ancient letters, in the Phoenician form. It 
is substantially the same as that which is printed in our 
Bibles; it distinguishes itself from this by the absence 
of the archaisms. We know that Samaria was repeo- 
pled by means of foreigners conquered by the Assyrians, 
after the transportation of the Israelites to Ninive: 
these pagans afflicted by God on account of their in- 
iquity, obtained from the king of Assyria that one of 
the priests transported could return and settle among 
them in order to teach theme the worship of his 
God. It is quite natural to suppose that it was this 
priest who brought the Pentateuch along. To believe 
many critics, who reject after the captivity the appear- 
ance of this Pentateuch, it cannot be seen whv the 



26 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Samaritans should have then accepted a book written 
in a foreign language, and one can see neither why the 
Pentateuch should not have been accompanied by the 
books of the Prophets. 

3. The new science of Egyptology has furnished 
to us another proof for the authenticity of the Penta- 
teuch. All that is related of Egypt, at the occasion of 
the sojourn of the Hebrews in this country and of their 
exodus, is in perfect accord with the state of Egypt 
such as it appeared under the Rameses; now this state 
was very different from what it should be later on, for 
example, in the epoch of Solomon or in that of the 
prophets. The Egypt of the Pentateuch is very differ- 
ent from that of the prophets: in the first, one sole 
state, in the second, an empire parcelled out Into small 
principalities; in the first, complete silence about the 
kingdom of Ethiopia, in the second, this kingdom ap- 
pears; in all the details we recover the same exactitude, 
proving that the Pentateuch is much anterior to the 
prophets. As to the Egyptian customs, we recover 
them faithfully depicted until to the smallest details: 
for striking examples, see chapters, Abraham, Joseph, 
Plagues of Egypt, etc. To be so exact the author of 
the history must necessarily have lived himself in Egypt 
with the people whose exodus he relates. 

4. Even the language of the Pentateuch is a confir- 
mation of its high antiquity; we meet therein, indeed, 
with linguistic archaisms which Ave find no longer in the 
other ])ooks of the Bible. The principal ones are: i. 
The frequent employ of the masculine for the feminine, 
for example, mhohou, ht,iov he, she, and in naary young 
man, for naarah, for young girl. 2. The employ of yod 
in order to connect two substantives. 3 A peculiar con- 



THE AUTHENTICITY OF THE PENTATEUCH. 2 J 

struction for the infinitive. 4. Certain poetic phrases, 
as to cover the eye with earth. 5. The absence of foreign 
words except Egyptian, which shows that the Hebrews, 
during the composition of the Pentateuch, were not 
in relation with the Assyrians and other nations, as they 
should be under the kings. 

5. The proofs we come to give are not all of equal 
value: that drawn, for example, from the Samaritan 
Pentateuch, is not so convincing as that founded upon 
the constant testimony of the Bible; but these proofs 
taken in their ensemble, do they give us a real certitude 
about the authenticity of the Pentateuch? All the ra- 
tionalists and, we have to admit, some Catholics, more 
audacious in criticism than prudent, deny this. For us, 
it seems that these proofs have or have not that charac- 
ter of evidence, according as one joins them or not to 
another argument, the argument of Prescription, or, 
if you wish, of Possession. Thus, supposing that the 
Pentateuch was unknown until now, or, lost as so many 
other books, were found to-day, and that one would 
have to assign to it a date and an author, one would 
be led, by the reasons exposed above, to conclude 
with a quasi -certitude that these books emanate from 
Moses; but we would have no perfect certitude about 
this, on account of the arguments which another would 
bring forward, and which would not leave any doubts 
to arise. But in reality the question does not pose it- 
self thus, and it is this what one forgets too often. In 
fact, we possess from immemorial times the Pentateuch, 
and we possess it as being from Moses. Now, posses- 
sion is equal to the title. We have received the Penta- 
teuch from the Jews; they themselves, as far as they 
may go back in their history, have no knowledge of any 



28 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

protestation made against the Mosaic origin of this 
book, which would be inexplicable if the Pentateuch 
would not come from Moses; we have therefore every 
possible reason to say: the Pentateuch is from Moses. 
And behold after a possession of more than twenty 
centuries, critics come and tell, us: But prove that the 
Pentateuch is from Moses! We are therefore in the same 
position as so inany proprietors to whom one would 
come and say, after several centuries have seen their 
ancestors possessing the same good: But prove that 
this same good belongs to you! We have the right 
to answer to the Rationalists: It is for you to prove 
that the Pentateuch is not from Moses. Messrs. critics, 
shoot first ! 

In placing ourselves upon this ground we are 
invincible; for to overthrow our thesis, it is not 
sufficient to show that such or such a fragment of 
the Pentateuch, or even the entire Pentateuch might 
not be from Moses; to this we would answer: 
admitted, but in fact it is from Moses. It would 
be sufificient neither, whether it was possible, that 
such or such a fact related by the Pentateuch ofifers 
improbabilities; we would answer: The true may 
sometimes not be very probable, and this fact is true, 
authentic, we know it; because we possess the Penta- 
teuch. Even it would not be sufficient to erect skil- 
fully a system which, adorned with the whole apparatus 
of science and with the artifices of language, might 
appear from the human point of view more probable than 
the system of the Mosaic origin of the Pentateuch; then 
even we would answer: This is not sufficient ! If it were 
you that had discovered the Pentateuch and brought it 
to us, and if there were simply questions of doing critical 



THE AUTHENTICITY OF THE PENTATEUCH 29 

work and inquire who might be its author, your theory 
might make an impression upon us; supposing even, if 
you wish, that it could conquer adherents among us. 
But, once more, the question does not pose itself thus: 
We have always possessed the Pentateuch as being from 
Moses, and to destroy this traditional belief, more than 
ingenious hypotheses are required, more than probabili- 
ties; we must have certain and invincible proofs, and 
you do not furnish these to us. 

But when, as we have said, a traditional possession 
can be destroyed only by convincing proofs, there 
remainsfor us to show, to complete theargument of pos- 
session, that the reasons brought forward by the ration- 
alists in favor of their system are not at all convincing. 
One knows that all the imagined theories by the critics 
in regard to the subject of the Pentateuch can be about 
reduced to the following system: The Pentateuch 
must be considered as an assemblage of fragments of 
different epochs rehandled and more or less well joined 
together in an epoch which one can put back until to 
the return of the captivity. Now, the reasons produced 
in favor of this thesis can be summed into three, which 
we shall successively refute: 

I. OBJECTION. 

The principal argument of the Rationalists is drawn 
from the diversity of names of God in the Pentateuch: 
beginning with the 6th chapter of Exodus. God is called 
indifferently Elohim or Jehovah, but in the whole of 
Genesis there are fragments where Elohim is found ex- 
clusively, and others where God is called, only Jehovah. 
The Rationalists conclude from this that Genesis is 
due at least to two authors, and that tradition which 



30 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

attributes it to Moses is apocryphal. In order that the 
conclusion of the critics might be founded, they would 
have to show that the name of Jehovah was unknown 
in the time of Moses; then one would have some found- 
ation for denying to him the Jehovistic passages; but 
in fact, according to Exodus (iii, 13-15), it is precisely 
to Moses that He revealed Himself as Jehovah. As 
for the explanation of this distinction of the Jehovistic 
and Elohistic passages, we can do it, either in supposing 
that Moses had in hands and inserted into the Penta- 
teuch more ancient documents wherein God is called 
Elohim, or in noticing that God is generally called 
Elohim when one represents Him as the God of the 
universe, and Jehovah when one speaks of Him as the 
God adored by the Hebrews. In every case it is abso- 
lutely impossible, in placing aside the Elohistic pas- 
sages, which are very numerous, to arrive to make 
thereof something that has resemblance to a well con- 
nected history. Einally, we will ask whether we must 
regard as Elohistic or as Jehovistic the quite numerous 
passages where both names are united together. 

2. OBJECTION. 

Again the critics believe of being able to deny the 
authenticity of the Pentateuch, in supporting them- 
selves upon certain contradictions which they pretend 
to discover therein; according to them, these contradic- 
tions can be explained only by the plurality of authors, 
who would have related the same fact in different man- 
ners. According to what we have said before, in order 
that this argument might have some value against us, 
the Rationalists would have to establish a contradiction 
in a manner, not only probable, but absolutely certain. 



THE AUTHENTICITY OF THE PENTATEUCH. 3 I 

Now these pretended contradictions are so easy to rec- 
oncile, that they have not even the merit of probabil- 
ity. Thus, they oppose to us examples of this kind: 
Jacob goes to Mesopotamia, here to seek a wife (Gen. 
xxvii, 46, etc.), and there to fly from the wrath of Esau 
(xxvii, 41-45); the wealth of Jacob is attributed here to 
the blessing of God (xxxi, 4-48), and there to the indus- 
try of the patriarch (xxx, 25-43); Joseph is sold by his 
brethren, here to Ismaelites (xxxvii, 25), and there to 
Madianites (28); the Hebrew slave must recover his 
liberty here after six years of service (Ex. xxi, 1-6), and 
there at the moment of the Jubilee year (Lev. xxv, 39- 
41). No long reflection is needed to see that there 
are things here which add and do not contradict them- 
selves: the flight of Jacob has two different motives; 
his wealth was caused by his industry, but the latter 
was blessed by God; the Madianites of Joseph were 
Ismaelites at the same title as the Yankees are Ameri- 
cans; finally, when the Hebrew slave should not serve 
more than six years, he had moreover the advantage 
to recover his liberty before this time, when meanwhile 
a Jubilee year took place. All the other contradictions 
imagined by the Rationalists are about as easy to solve, 
and it seems useless to insist any further on them. 

3. OBJECTION. 

Finally, certain analogous facts, which are repeated 
several times in the epoch of the patriarchs, are, for this 
reason several times related by the Bible, and the Ra- 
tionalists have believed to see in these repetitions the 
proof for the existence of several documents put to- 
gether. Here again the answer is easy: why should 
there not be some analogous accounts, when several 



32 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

analogous facts produced themselves? Can the critics 
prove, for instance, that Sara was not carried off twice : 
in Egypt and at Gerara (Gen. xii, xx); that Abimelech 
did not contract an alliance, with Abraham first, then 
with Isaac (xxi, xxvi) ; that God could not send twice 
quails to the Hebrews in the desert, nor to cause to 
spring forth water twice from a rock (Ex. xvi, xvii; 
Num. xi, xx)? Evidently the critics can prove nothing 
in this regard, and between their hypothetical affirma- 
tions and the repeated accounts of the Pentateuch, 
there can be no hesitation. 

Thus the objections of the Rationalists against the 
authenticity of the Pentateuch serve absolutely for 
nothing. We are deceived: they have a great usefulness, 
they conform more strongly its authenticity. Indeed, a 
thesis must be very solid for having been able to resist 
to so many, and, let us tell it, to such skilful attacks. 
Now, the Catholic thesis resists and subsists in spite of 
all. On the contrary, what do we see from the side of our 
adversaries? The systems change constantly, and the 
Rationalists themselves would laugh if one would 
make the attempt to resurrect some of the theories of 
their predecessors. In reality, they are agreed only 
upon one point, namely to deny the authenticity of the 
Pentateuch, and their accord upon this point is too 
complete not to be suspicious, especially in the presence 
of their disaccord, quite as complete, when there is ques- 
tion to elaborate a positive theory and to make anew 
the history of the composition of the Pentateuch. We 
do not need to enter here into detail of these theories; 
we keep ourselves only in the defensive; but neverthe- 
less we have to remark in ending, what a beautiful con- 
firmation of the authenticity of the Pentateuch, is this 



HISTORICAL OBJECTIONS. 33 

disaccord of the Rationalists when there is question 
for them to explain its origin outside of Moses! Dis- 
accord so perfect, that the same passage, studied intrin- 
sically by five different RationaHsts, will be attributed 
by them to five different epochs and separated by an 
interval of several centuries! When the intrinsic crit- 
icism gives such scientific results, it would be from its 
part more just, and more modest at the same time, not 
to despise the intrinsic testimonies: these, at least,- have 
never varied, and have only one sole voice to proclaim 
that the Pentateuch is from Moses. 



CHAPTER III. 



HISTORICAL OBJECTIONS AGAINST THE AU- 
THENTICITY OF THE PENTATEUCH. 

I. UNITY OF SANCTUARY. 

DIFFERENT to the CathoHc reUgion, where God 
multiplies His presence in thousands of churches, 
the Jewish religion admitted only one Ark of Covenant, 
one sole Temple, and before this Temple, one sole 
Tabernacle. Thereby God wished to impress more 
profoundly into the minds of the Hebrews the mono- 
theistic idea. He had promised to dwell in a particular 
manner in the Tabernacle (Ex. xxv, 8) and, conse- 
quently, the unity of the sanctuary quite naturally 
reminded them on the unity of God. 

The Rationalists deny this teaching of the Bible: 
to believe them, the Hebrews have no knowledge at all 

D. B.-3 



34 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

of the unity of the sanctuary; on the contrary, they had 
in a permanent manner a great number of local sanctu- 
aries, and this since their first beginnings until their 
transportation into Assyria and Chaldea. 

"Deuteronomy," says Mr. Wellhausen, "permits to 
render to God a solemn worship only in one sole place. 
This is an important prescription. Now, there is noth- 
ing of the kind. Nowhere do we meet with the allusion 
to a law of this kind. The prophets often rise against 
idolatry, but never against the plurality of places con- 
secrated to worship. The "Book of the Covenant" 
approves of the multiplication of altars (Ex. xx, 24-25). 
Deuteronomy is the first that preaches the centraliza- 
tion of worship, favored by the fall of Samaria. The 
Sacerdotal Code goes still further and removes the in- 
stitution ot one sole place in the time of exodus by the 
double fiction of the central Tabernacle and the Ark it 
placed therein. 

To answer to this objection, let us examine the 
texts themselves whose Mosaic origin they contest. It 
is drawn from Exodus (xx, 24-25). This law does not 
prescribe the unity of altar; on the contrary, it says that 
one may raise one, either of earth or of non-polished 
stone, all over where God will honor its name, that is, 
in very difTerent places. The Rationalists themselves 
l)eing agreed to this, we do not need to insist thereon; 
this passage is the destruction of their thesis. In the 
desert they ofTered sacrifice to God wherever they 
camped. Later on they did this in various places, be- 
cause the law of Exodus permitted it: at Siloe (Judges 
xviii, 31); Cariathiarim (i Kings vii, i); Masphat 
(vii, 6-9); Ramatha (vii, 17); Galgala (x, 8); Bethlehem 
(xvi, 2); Gabaon (3 Kings iii, 4) etc., to speak only of 



HISTORICAL OBJECTIONS. 35 

the time previous to the building of the Temple. In 
order to raise an altar in any place, it was sufficient 
"that the memory of God's name was made there" (Ex. 
XX, 24). 

The prescription reported above was promulgated 
upon Mount Sinai, the third month after the departure 
from Egypt, immediately after the Decalogue, whose 
complement it is. Some time afterwards; after the erec- 
tion of the Tabernacle and the organization of worship, 
Moses, in the name of God, carried the law as found in 
Leviticus (xvii, 3-9). The law contained in this pas- 
sage forbids to slaughter any of the animals which might 
be offered as a sacrifice, without offering them to Jeho- 
vah, even then were one to immolate them only to eat 
their flesh. According to Wellhausen, this law is pos- 
terior to the captivity. To maintain a similar opinion, 
to pretend that it was in the time of Esdras when it was 
forbidden to immolate victims, in the camp or outside 
the camp, and to offer them elsewhere except at the 
door of the Tabernacle, when there was neither camp 
nor Tabernacle, is a perfect nonsense. Wellhausen 
himself acknowledges that the interpretation which 
he gives to the text is, ''according to its contents, im- 
possible to execute and to put into practice," but never- 
theless, he concludes that this passage forbids ''to 
slaughter an animal, even for profane use, outside of 
Jerusalem, contrarily to the concession which Deuteron- 
omy had made" and of which we shall speak very soon. 
When one is forced to explain the texts thus; when one 
pretends that a law promulgated by a reasonable man, 
and regarded as divine by an entire people, prohibited 
to this same people, then dispersed not only in the 
whole of Palestine, but also in Assyria, Chaldea, Persia 



36 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

and Egypt, to eat, under pain of death, the flesh of any 
animal that was not killed at Jerusalem; when one at- 
tributes to a writer such an absurdity to maintain a 
hypothesis which is in contradiction with the tradition 
of all centuries, does he not furnish himself the proof 
that he maintains a false and erroneous hypothesis? If 
a Catholic author would emit similar explanations to 
defend the Mosaic origin of the Pentateuch, what 
would one say of him and of such kind of arguments? 

As much as the explanation of Wellhausen is con- 
trary to common sense, so much is that furnished by tra- 
dition, in being conformant to real chronology, simple, 
natural and logical. As one might have, under pretext 
to kill an animal for eating, offered'it to false deities, ''to 
devils," says the text, within or without the camp, the 
legislator, in order to prevent all danger of idolatry, 
prohibits to slaughter any of the victims which might 
be offered into sacrifice, without offering them to the 
true God, at the door of the Tabernacle, even when one 
has no other reason to kill them than that to use the 
flesh thereof as nourishment. The remedy was very 
efficacious and cut short to idolatry; it could be easily 
executed in the desert, because every Israelite was near 
the Tabernacle and the usage of flesh meat was very rare 
among the Israelites in the desert, as it is still at all 
the nomad and pastoral peoples of the Orient. 

But when it is easy to observe this law in the penin- 
sula of Sinai, this was the case no longer, when the 
twelve tril^es were dispersed in the east and west of the 
Jordan; also a1)out forty years later, in the time when 
Israel went to take finally possession of the Promised 
Land, Moses abrogates the law of Leviticus which now 
could be observed no longer (Deut. xi, 31-32). 



HISTORICAL OBJECTIONS. ' 37 

The spirit -of the new law is the same as that in Le- 
viticus; it has for chief end to prevent idolatry. Just 
as God had forbidden to offer in the desert of Sinai 
sacrifices to the devils, to the deities of the desert, He 
now forbids to offer them upon high places to the idols 
which the Chanaanites adored. In the peninsula of 
Sinai, in order to hinder all the abuses, He prescribed 
to offer no sacrifice, except before the Tabernacle; as 
henceforth this will be impracticable. He ordains to de- 
stroy everything that reminds of the Chanaanite wor- 
ship. The Israelites, under the influence of the belief 
then dominating among the nations, that each country, 
as each people, had its particular gods, must have been 
strongly tempted to .adore the false gods of the land 
of Chanaan, in associating them with the worship of 
the true God. Moses foresees this danger and to hinder 
his people to underlay to the temptation he prescribes 
to destroy everything that reminds of idolatry. 

After having passed this ordinance, Moses, by the 
abrogation of the law of Leviticus, expressly authorizes 
the Israehtes to eat in all places, without being bound 
to any particular rite, the flesh of animals offered into 
sacrifice, even that of game and of clean animals which 
cannot be offered to the Lord. The right to eat all 
over the flesh of clean animals is so natural that the per- 
mission given here can be explained only because it 
abolishes an anterior defense, carried in special circum- 
stances. As much as everything is consequent and easily 
intelligible, in the traditional and chronological order, 
so much is everything forced and incomprehensible in 
the interpretation of the Rationalists. One can grant 
to somebody the authorization to do what everybody 
does only in the case where one did formerly forbid it 



38 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

to him for exceptional reasons. Deuteronomy abro- 
gates therefore, at the leaving of the desert, a law which 
could be observed only in the desert. In future one 
will be bound no longer to present before the Taberna- 
cle the ox, the sheep, or the goat one desires to eat. 

Finally, let us remark that the new law does not 
prescribe to offer all the sacrifices before the Taber- 
nacle. Neither Exodus nor Deuteronomy tells this. 
There is no longer question here, as in Leviticus, of the 
Tabernacle. All the Lord ordains is to offer the hol- 
ocausts in the place He wdll choose. The place which He 
selected subsequently was Jerusalem, where the Temple 
arose, and which became the dwelling of His holi- 
ness. Then they should render to Him, upon the moun- 
tain consecrated to His worship, the homages and ador- 
ations of all the people. Until that time, before the 
divine selection, we cannot see why it should have been 
illicit to offer to God's sacrifices ''in all the places where 
they made memory of His name," according to the ex- 
pressions of Exodus. Moreover, even after the build- 
ing of the Temple, we discover nowhere any formal 
and absolute defense to offer sacrifices, when there are 
reasons to do so, outside of Jerusalem. The law of 
Exodus is not expressly abrogated in Deuteronomy. 
In the last book, Moses has not attached to his pre- 
scription the completely exclusive sense, which the Ra- 
tionalists give to it. When one reads carefully the 
terms which we have quoted, a measure prescribing the 
centralization of worship can be seen therein, indeed, 
but we find nothing therein which expresses the defense 
to offer sacrifices outside the place selected, when ex- 
traordinary circumstances may require this. The ob- 
ject of the law is to favor the unity of worship, in 



HISTORICAL OBJECTIONS. 39 

authorizing the official and ordinary service of religion 
only in one place, but it is good to remark that the 
legislator employs no absolute and quite restrictive 
term; he does not pronounce the pain of death against 
the prevaricators, as he had done in Leviticus; he does 
not say: you shall offer all your holocausts, without ex- 
ception, only and inclusively in the place which God has 
selected, but simply: ''you shall offer your holocausts 
in the place which God shall choose." When one keeps 
account of the Oriental habits and of the genius of 
the Hebrew language, which so easily employs univer- 
sal expressions and formulas that are hyperbolical in 
our eyes, this reserved manner to announce the law is 
very significant. Hence there is nothing astonishing 
that the Israelites did not understand the ordinance in 
an absolute sense and they did not beHeve that if, in 
ordinary cases, it was in the Temple itself they had to 
offer all the sacrifices, in extraordinary cases and when 
they had reasons to act differently, one did not violate 
a law which was not imposed in a strict manner and 
without exception. The Pentateuch and the example 
of Moses justify this interpretation. Not only had the 
liberator of the Hebrews raised himself an altar after 
the victory over Amalek (Ex. xvii, 5), but he had pre- 
scribed, in Deuteronomy, to build one upon Mount 
Hebal, after the conquest of the Promised Land, which 
Josue faithfully executed.^ Therefore the RationaUsts 
alter the meaning of the prescription of Deuteronomy 
and are more rigorous than the Jews themselves in 



^ Deut. xxvii, 5, etc. ; Jos. viii, 30, etc. Josue also raises an 
altar at Sichem, Jos. xxiv, 26. As to the altar built in the east of the 
Jordan by the transjordanic tribes, the latter are reproached, not to 
violate the law, but for desiring to cause a schism. 



40 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

interpreting the text as they do, in a partisan and inter- 
ested spirit. 

Indeed, the Jews beUeved that God could authorize 
His prophets to abrogate certain prescriptions of the 
law. The history of the temple built by the Jews of 
Egypt atLeontopolis furnishes us a remarkable example 
of this. The law of Deuteronomy prohibited incontest- 
ably to raise a temple outside the territory of the twelve 
tribes, and when that of Jerusalem had been constructed, 
they considered as ilHcit to build another one elsewhere. 
In consequence of this regulation, the Jews did never 
wish to acknowledge the temple of Mount Garizim as 
legitimate, and very probably because all the Israelites 
beheved that there could be in Palestine but one house 
of God which, before the arrival of the Samaritans in 
the north of Palestine, the kings of the ten tribes, even 
the most powerful, even those who were most ambi- 
tious to erect buildings and raise temples to Baal, raised 
never any to the true God. Nevertheless when 
the Jews of Egypt, under the reign of Ptolemy Phys- 
con, built a temple at Leontopolis, although those of 
Jerusalem beheld this undertaking with a very evil 
eye, they did not condemn it as they had done for 
the temple on Mount Garizim, and the Talmud teaches 
us that when the priests who had served in the Egyp- 
tian temple were not admitted to fulfill their func- 
tions in that of Jerusalem, they were not however 
excluded from the assistance in the exercises of wor- 
ship. The Egyptian Jews were never treated as 
schismatics. What was the cause of this difference of 
conduct? The following: To justify themselves, the 
Jews of Egypt had supported themselves upon a text 
of Isaias, announcing that ''J^^^^ah would have an 



HISTORICAL OBJECTIONS. 4I 

altar in the midst of Egypt. ".^ Did this prophecy really 
legitimate their conduct? We do not need to examine 
this here. It is sufficient for us to state that the Jews 
did not doub.t that the Lord could inspire His proph- 
ets with things in contradiction with the law, and 
that when they could interpret the law in this manner 
in this circumstance, they could interpret it in others 
in an analogous manner. Consequently supposing 
even that Moses had really forbidden in Deuteronomy 
to offer any sacrifice outside the place chosen by God, 
the prophets, the men of God, by an order or by an 
inspiration from His part, would have had the right 
to offer sacrifices in any place of Palestine, and the con- 
duct of Gedeon, Samuel and Elias, would be only a 
derogation to an ordinance which obliged neither its 
author nor those who represented him. 

Therefore we do not need to enter into a detailed 
discussion of the facts alleged by Messrs. Wellhausen, 
Reuss and Kuenen to establish that the law of the 
unity of the sanctuary did not exist before the last 
years of the kingdom of Juda. In fact it did not exist 
and it never did exist in the absolute sense which 
they attribute to it. The prescription of Deuteronomy 
indeed dates from the time of Moses, but they did not 
understand it, and with right, as they understand it, 
and this simple observation is sufficient to make crum- 
ble their whole thesis. They pretend to prove that 
Deuteronomy was not yet written in the time of 
Samuel and of the prophet Elias, because, they say, 
these personages offered sacrifices in different places, 
contrarilyto the ordinances of Deuteronomy, which they 
never would have done, if this book would have already 

* Is. xix, 19; Josephus, Ant. Jud. xiii, iii, i. 



42 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

been known in their time. Certainly, if they had be- 
Heved that God prohibited it indeed or that He did not 
dispense them from this general law, by virtue of the 
mission which He had intrusted to them; but when 
they did not believe themselves bound to observe what 
the Rationalists suppose or when they believed them- 
selves dispensed therefrom, what can one infer from 
their conduct against the existence of Deuteronomy? 
Absolutely nothing. 

Thus, in summary. Exodus permits to offer sacri- 
fices in various places, and in the desert even they 
oft"er sacrifices to God all over where they camp. 
Leviticus ordained to offer all the sacrifices before the 
Tabernacle, and forbidded to slaughter, even for a sim- 
ple, profane usage, any of the animals w^hich might be 
oft'ered to God, without offering them in effect, in 
order to hinder thereby more easily every act of idol- 
atry. On the eve of taking possession of the Promised 
Land, Moses abrogated this double law of Leviticus; 
he commanded in Deuteronomy to offer the sacrifices 
in one sole place, to preserve more easily the purity 
of the dogma and to hinder the people from adoring 
the false gods; but he formulated his ordinance into 
such terms that they did not imply an absolute pro- 
hibition to offer victims elsewhere. One can apply 
them only to ordinary cases and interpret them in the 
sense that it was not illicit to erect also in other places, 
at least transitorily, altars to the true God. The ex- 
planation of the three legal texts concerning the place 
of worship, made also in the traditional and chrono- 
logical order, offers therefore no difficulty, whilst on 
the contrary that of the Rationalists, who refuse to 
admit their Mosaic origin, obliges them to exaggerate 



HISTORICAL OBJECTIONS. 43 

the bearing of the law of Deuteronomy and to attach 
to that of Leviticus an inadmissible and quite unrea- 
sonable meaning. 

2. THE SACRIFICES AT THE HEBREWS. 

The Bible tells us that the sacrifices, although 
anterior at the Hebrews to the appearance of Moses, 
were regulated by him, and that he fixed with preci- 
sion the nature, the epoch, the rite of the various sacri- 
fices to be offered to Jehovah. But the Rationalists 
do not wish to behold in Moses the legislator of the 
Hebrews; for them the ritual, the Sacerdotal Code, 
dates only since the return from the captivity and must 
be ascribed to Esdras. 

What the Rationalists call Sacerdotal Code must 
have indeed for object, before all, to regulate the rites 
and ceremonies because it is drawn up solely for 
this purpose, but to conclude from this that the 
Code is posterior to the captivity, it is very far. When 
historical books do not reproduce this ritual, it is 
because they had to record only the events. And 
when one tries especially to show that the sacrifice 
has been offered to the true God, not to idols, it is 
because the people had a marked inchnation towards 
idolatry, whilst the sacrificer was not moved by any 
passion to violate the sacrificial laws and, consequently, 
had to dread no transgressions from this side. "They 
had besides seldom an occasion, as can be easily 
imagined, to describe the sacrificial rite." It is Mr. 
Wellhausen himself who avows this. He is also 
obliged to acknowledge that the language of the proph- 
ets proves that in their time, that js, according to his 
opinion, before the creation of the Levitical rites, they 



44 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

attached the greatest importance to worship and to 
the sacrifices, because the prophets often rise against 
the excessive formalism which induces both priests and 
people to attach themselves more to the exterior of 
worship than to the reform of the dispositions of the 
heart. 

But it is not only the legal ritual which they ignored 
before the Captivity, according to Wellhausen, but 
the division itself of the sacrifices. The Sacerdotal 
Code distinguishes four kinds of them: the holocaust, 
olah ; the sacrifice for sin, hattat; the sacrifice for 
crime, asam ; and the peaceable sacrifice, selem. The 
professor of Marburg agYees that the holocaust and 
the peaceable sacrifice have always been in use, because 
the Bible mentions them frequently, but he assures us 
that before Ezechiel one does not find ''any trace" of 
the sacrifice for sin, ''neither in the Jehovist nor in the 
Deuteronomist, nor in any historical and prophetic 
book." This assertion is not correct. The sacrifice 
for sin is expressly mentioned in one of the most an- 
cient Psalms: "Sacrifice and oblation, O Lord, thou 
didst not desire. . . . Burnt offering and sinful 
offering thou didst not require." (Ps. xxxix, 7.) 

We find a very clear allusion to this kind of sacri- 
fices in the history of Heli, when the Lord said to the 
young Samuel: "I have sworn to the house of Heli, 
that the iniquity of his house shall not be expiated 
with victims nor offerings forever." (i Kings iii, 14.) 
The prophet Osee speaking of the priests, names ex- 
pressly the hattat: "They shall eat the hattat of my 
people" (Osee iv, 8), that is, the victims offered for the 
Israelites as sacrifices for sin, for the word hattat, as 
we have seen, is the Hebrew word of the sacrifice 



HISTORICAL OBJECTIONS. 45 

for sin, and the priests, after having burned the fatty 
parts of the immolated lamb or ram, ate the flesh 
which belonged to them by right. 

The hattat is, therefore, mentioned in the Sacred 
Scriptures, outside the Pentateuch, long before Eze- 
chiel. It is the same with the sacrifice for crime, the 
asam. The latter resembled so much the preceding 
that the commentators are not in agreement until 
to-day to point out the differences which distinguished 
the one from the other; but, be it as it may, there is 
question thereof, in the same tim.e as of the sacrifice 
for sin, in a passage of the Book of Kings, where we 
read, in regard to the revenues of the Temple, in the 
time of king Joas: "The money of the asam and 
the money of the hattaot, they did not bring into the 
Temple of the Lord, because it belonged to the 
priests "(4 Kings xii, 16). This manner of speaking 
supposes that these two kinds of sacrifices are per- 
fectly known. In a still more ancient epoch, in the 
time of the Judges, the Philistines who had captured 
the Ark, and who had been struck on this account 
with different evils, returned it to the God of Israel 
with asam to obtain pardon for their fault. The 
hattat and asam have therefore been known at all 
times at the Hebrews, but on account of their nature 
itself, they have been named only occasionally, be- 
cause they did not enter into the great acts of public 
worship, as the holocaust and the peaceful sacrifice, 
which were an essential part of the rejoicings and of 
the feast, and were associated with all the great events 
of the history of the people of God. 

When among the writers of the Old Testament, 
outside the Pentateuch, Ezechiel alone has spoken in 



46 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

detail m regard to the worship and ceremonies, the 
reason is quite natural; it is because he, like Moses, 
is the only writer that treats upon this subject. Where 
will one find, for instance, details about the military 
tactics, except in the writings where one studies them? 
Where can one equally meet with the Levitical ritual, 
if not in the prophet who announces its restoration? 
The second part of the prophecy of Ezechiel is des- 
tined to picture the glorious future reserved to Juda 
after the Captivity. Israel should reobtain its lost 
country; the new kingdom of God will rise again and 
religion will flourish again more brilliant and more 
beautiful than ever. From the depth of his exile the 
seer greets already the splendors of this bright aurora. 
Under the conduct of an angel, he visits beforehand 
the restored Temple, and perceives with his own eyes 
the Promised Land restored to the race of Jacob; 
as in the days of his youth, he is upon Mount Moriah, 
and this priest of the ancient Temple delays willingly 
in the description of the new, which he sees already 
erect; he exposes with deHght the rites followed in the 
sacrifices and in the various ceremonies of the worship 
of Jehovah; his heart overflows with joy in picturing 
those tableaus which revive in him the so dear past 
and make him forget the pains of the present. The 
abundance of the details which we read in his proph- 
ecy, compared to the small number of allusions which 
we find in the other books, explains itself therefore 
without difficulty by the very nature of the subject 
which he treats, namely, that of the ritual portion of 
the Pentateuch. The historical writings have not 
furnished to us the same indications, because a ritual 
act is not an historical act; the other historical writ- 



HISTORICAL OBJECTIONS. 47 

ings do not teach us anything neither, because the 
prophets arose only against the reigning vices and 
did not need to reproach the priests for neglecting 
the observation of the sacred rites, to which the peo- 
ple attached rather a too great an importance. Eze- 
chiel was no longer in the same situation as the other 
prophets; he wrote in a moment when, the Temple 
being destroyed, the sacrifices, with their traditional 
rites, had ceased to be offered at Jerusalem. To con- 
sole himself and to console his brethren in mourning 
for Sion, he shows the worship rising again in the 
future and in his prophetic pictures he recalls to mind 
the events of the past and of the country, always so 
dear to the unfortunate and exiled. 

Not only the numerous recollections of the Levit- 
ical rites contained in Ezechiel explain themselves 
by the very character of his prophecy, they are more- 
over, independently from all the other proofs we have 
given, a strong presumption in favor of the pre-exist- 
ence of these rites. In fact it is only through a 
manifest inconsequence that the rationalistic critics 
pretend to make Ezechiel the inventor of the Israelitic 
ritual. They generally acknowledge that the second 
part of his book is only an embellished tableau of 
what he had seen in Jerusalem in his youth. The 
Temple which he describes is not a purely ideal temple; 
it is the temple of Solomon; the number of buildings, 
the sacred implements, the whole of his description, 
is only a faithful picture, except some details added 
for ornament, of what has remained deeply engraved 
in his memory. How, therefore, could he have in- 
vented the ritual with all its particulars, since in all the 
rest he has m.ainly reproduced only what existed already 



48 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

before? Undoubtedly, this is not impossible, but is 
contrary to all analogies, and since tradition has always 
placed the composition of the Pentateuch a long 
time before Ezechiel, and since we find in all the other 
Hebrew accounts manifest allusions to the ceremonial 
laws before this prophet, we are not permitted to 
maintain that these laws date only from his epoch. 
Besides can one imagine that there existed no ritual 
in the time of Solomon? No; because it was necessary 
for worship; there were some rites in all the temples. 
The Phenician inscription of Marseille furnishes the 
proof of this for the temples of Phenicia. Hence, 
Ezechiel must have made known to us this ritual an- 
terior to the Captivity, as he has made known to us 
in his descriptions the ancient temple itself. 

3. FEASTS OF THE HEBREWS. 

The Plebrews had five great annual feasts: The 
Pasch, Pentacost, the feast of the Tabernacles, that 
of Expiation and that of the Trumpets. These five 
feasts are indicated and their celebration was regu- 
lated by Moses. But to believe the Rationalists these 
feasts are of recent institution, not Mosaic. ''Primi- 
tively," says Mr. Wellhausen, "they were all profane 
feasts and had no other end in view but to celebrate 
the comm.encement and the end of harvest (Easter and 
Pentecost) or the vintages (feast of the Tabernacles). 
The Sacerdotal Code not only changed their character, 
but increased also their numbers by introducing the 
feast of the Trumpets and the solemnity of the Expia- 
tion or the great day of fast inaugurated during the 
Captivity. The Sabbatic year, and especially the 
Jubilee year are also of recent date. We meet with 



HISTORICAL OBJECTIONS. 49 

them only in the collection of the laws of Leviticus, 
xvii-xxvi, accepted and rehandled by the Sacerdotal 
Code." 

All these afBrmations of negative criticism are not 
supported by any proof. Here, as in all other cases, 
it is forced to avow that it has no other argument to 
allege but that of silence of the texts; it cannot bring 
forward the least historical argument and testimony in 
favor of its system. All what it finds to tell is that, 
if the feast of the Jubilee year, dated from the Mosaic 
time, we ought to discover traces thereof in the 
writings anterior to the Captivity of Babylon, outside 
the Hexateuch, that is, of the Pentateuch and Josue. 

Even were this really the case, the demonstration 
would be insufficient, but what criticism advances is 
false. First it is deceived by what it tells of the Jubilee 
year, prescribed by Leviticus (xxv, 8) and called in 
this book "the year of propitiation, the year of 
remission "(xxv, 9-10). Isaias makes allusion like Eze- 
chiel to the legal Jubilee (Isaias Ixi, i ; Ezechiel xlvi, 17). 
Nehemias expressly attributes to Moses the institution 
of the Sabbatic year (x, 29-31). As to the feasts we 
have already established their Mosaic origin. The his- 
torians did not note, as can be easily understood, the 
observation of the legal solemnities, when they had 
no reason to do so; however they speak of them when 
circumstances furnished occasion for this. Thus we 
see that the great feast of the Pasch is celebrated by the 
Israelites, according to the ordinances of Moses, right 
away after having entered the land of Chanaan (Jos. 
V, 10) and in different epochs of their history. The 
author of Kings relates that under Josias, they celebra- 
ted it with greater solemnity than they had done since 

D. B.— 4 



50 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

the time of the Judges (4 Kings xxiii, 21-22). There- 
fore, the historian did not doubt that they had cele- 
brated it since the time of the Judges, although with 
less pomp and 'magnificence. Osee (xii, 9-10) makes 
allusion to the feast of the Tabernacles; the Book 
of Nehemias (viii, 14) assures us that it was Moses who 
instituted this solemnity during which the peoples 
dwelt under tents. Isaias speaks of the cycle of the 
feasts (xxix, t ; xxxii, 9; etc.). 

As to the feasts which Wellhausen pretends to have 
been added by the Sacerdotal Code to the three an- 
cient feasts, that of the Trumpets and of the Day of 
Expiation, his af^rmation is not correct. Chapter 
xxxiii of Leviticus does not enumerate the feasts, but 
simply the time fixed to celebrate what they called the 
''Holy Convocation." Neither the Book of the Cove- 
nant in Exodus, nor Deuteronomy makes mention of the 
time, because they enumerate only the feasts which 
obliged the Israelites to render themselves into the place 
where the sanctuary of Jehovah was. Hence, it comes 
that the Sabbath is not even mentioned at the occa- 
sion of the laws about these feasts. The solemnity 
of the feast of the Trumpets and of the Day of Expia- 
tion, not requiring the presence of the faithful before 
the Tabernacle, are omitted for this reason. They are 
neither mentioned in the other books of the Old 
Testament; but this argument from silence proves 
nothing against their existence, because the sacred 
writers had no occasion to speak thereof, so that if 
the silence were conclusive, it would follow that the 
feast of Expiation would not have existed before Herod, 
in 37 B. C, because there is no mention made of it 
before this epoch. 



HISTORICAL OBJECTIONS. , 5 I 

4. THE PRIESTS AND LEVITES AT THE HEBREWS. 

Not content to deny the Mosaic origin of the feasts 
at the Hebrews, Wellhausen also denies the Mosaic 
origin of the priesthood, in order to draw from this a new 
argument against the authenticity of the Pentateuch. 
He pretends that the distinction between priests and 
Levites is of recent invention: "Ezechiel is the first 
Hebrew author," he says, "who makes a distinction 
between priests and Levites. . . ." 

In spite of the affirmation of the Professor of Mar- 
burg, it is not less true that all what concerns the 
priesthood is of Mosaic institution, and nothing is more 
historical and more certain than that vv^hich wc read in 
regard to this subject in the Pentateuch. 

Nothing is easier to explain than the establish- 
ment of the priesthood in Israel. There was at the 
Egyptians since the most remote antiquity, a hierarch- 
ical constituted priesthood, which was very numerous 
and influential. What is there astonishing that Moses, 
whose special end in view it was to establish solidly 
the religion in Israel, did institute a priesthood, ''re- 
minding by many traits of the Egyptian priesthood?" 
What is there astonishing that in order to fulfill its func- 
tions he chose his own family and his own tribe? Wliat 
is there astonishing that he gave to it a ritual during 
his leisure hours of the nomadic life in the desert, 
when the daily offering of sacrifices caused often un- 
foreseen cases to arise which required to be regulated? 
Also the ancient existence of this ritual is established 
by the writings themselves whose origin anterior to the 
Captivity the most extreme critics are forced to admit. 

Besides nothins: is less ''lesfendarv" than the details 



52 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

which the Book of Numbers (xvi) furnishes about the 
opposition which Moses met with when he conferred the 
sacerdotal rights upon the family of his brother Aaron. 
Members of the tribe of Ruben, eldest son of Jacob, 
to whom belonged by right the sacerdotal functions, 
according to the patriarchal customs, refused to accept 
the new institution, and even descendants of Levi 
jealous of the privileges conferred upon Aaron, made 
common cause with the Rubenites and revolted with 
them. If the priesthood of Aaron were not historical, 
as Wellhausen claims, it would have been attributed 
to Moses. Moses would have been both the high priest 
and chief of his people; his sons and not Josue would 
have succeeded him in the commandery; they would 
have had like the latter, a select portion in the division 
of "the Promised Land, and the author of the Parali- 
pomenons (Par. vi.) would have not described so care- 
fully the genealogy of Aaron and of his descendants, 
after having mentioned only that of Moses. Similar 
facts are not at all "mystic inventions," but bear the 
seal of the reality. Besides the whole history of Israel 
confirms what the Pentateuch teaches. It is suffi- 
cient to read the episode of Michas, in the Book of 
Judges, to recognize that the tribe of Levi was in Israel 
the sacerdotal tribe. What is more significant, among 
other things, than the word of Michas when the 
Levite has consented to fulfill in his house the func- 
tions of the priesthood: ''Now I know that God will 
do me good since I have a priest of the race of the 
Levites?"^ Mr. Wellhausen assures us that this Levite 



* Judges XVII, 13. We read the name priests thirty-four times 
m the two Books of Samuel, sixty times in the Third and Fourth of 
Kings, etc. 



HISTORICAL OBJECTIONS. 53 

"drew his value from its great rarity," but he does 
not dare to contest the antiquity of the passage which 
contains this account, and thus we have a sufficient 
proof of the existence of the Levites, in the epoch 
which immediately followed Moses and Josue. When 
this passage does not prove by itself the distinction 
of the priesthood and of the Levitic ministry, it proves 
at least the distinction between the clergy and the 
people. On the other hand, the difference of attribu- 
tion between the descendants of Aaron and the other 
Levites is clearly pointed out in the institutions of 
David (i Par. xxiii-xxvi). 

At the commencement of the schism, under the 
reign of Roboam, nephew of David, one of the crimes 
with which Jeroboam, the first king of the ten tribes, 
is reproached, is for having established priests that 
were not of the race of Levi (3 Kings xii, 13), Jere- 
mias (xxxiii, 21) expressly distinguishes between the 
leviyim and the kohanim, ''the Levites and the priests." 
And before Jeremias, long before the copy of the law 
had been recovered in the Temple, the Books of Kings, 
in relating the feast of the dedication of the Temple 
of Solomon, mention separately the priests and the 
Levites. When the sacred writers do not always 
explicitly distinguish between the priests and Levites, 
the reason is to be. brief. The priests were really 
Levites or of the tribe of Levi. This manner of speak- 
ing is so natural that the biblical authors who have 
lived after Ezechiel often express themselves as their 
predecessors, in a general fashion and without making 
any distinction, from which one could conclude, if one 
would reason like Wellhausen, either that the priests 
and the Levites were not yet distinct from one another, 



54 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

or that the Parahpomenons, Esdras, and Nehemias are 
more ancient than the Pentateuch. Undoubtedly, 
when we compare the priesthood and its attributions 
such as they go forth from the last prophets, with that 
which we read in the Pentateuch, we remark a develop- 
ment and a progress, due to time and circumstances, 
but we also behold that the most ancient form is the 
Mosaic form. 

The prescriptions in regard to the priesthood are 
the same in Moses and in Ezechiel, for instance, as to 
the exterior behavior, the abstaining of intoxicating 
liquors during the exercise of their functions (Lev. v, 
9; Ezech. xliv, 21), marriage (Lev. xxi, 13-14; Ezech. 
xliv, 22,) the removing of corpses (Lev. xxi, 11; Ezech. 
xliv, 25). When we see sometimes kings offer sacrifices, 
as Saul and Ozias (i Kings xiii, 9-14; 2 Par. xxvi, 
16-21), the chastisements which they incurred are a 
confirmation of the Law instead of proving that it did 
not exist. One pretends, it is true, that Ezechiel per- 
mits to the king to offer the sacrifice of Expiation 
(xlv, 17), but this is a false interpretation. When the 
sovereign has the right to present victims in the name 
of the people, he does not offer them as God's 
minister: the prophet tells explicitly: "The priests 
shall offer his holocaust and his peace-offerings" (Eze- 
chiel xlvi, 2). 

As to the high priests, not only can we establish 
their existence, but we can draw up the almost com- 
plete list of them since Aaron, the brother of Moses 
and the first pontiff of Israel, until the time of Our 
Saviour. Josephus has given us a summary of the 
history of the sovereign pontificate in his "Hebrew 
Antiquities." He might have had in hands documents 



HISTORICAL OBJECTIONS. 55 

which we possess no longer, but it was sufficient for 
him to open the Sacred Books to draw therefrom 
the most of the accounts which he has given to us. 
Aaron had for successor his son Eleazar, who himself 
leaves the priesthood to his son Phinees (Jos. xxiv, 33; 
I Par. ix, 20; Judges xx, 28). Heli, descendant of 
Aaron, exercises the office of the high priesthood about 
the end of the period of the Judges (i Kings ii, 27-33; 
Judges xvii). In Saul's time and in that of David and 
Solomon, Abimelech, Abiathar, Sadok, Azarias (i 
Kings xxii, 9; 11-20; 2 Par. viii, 17; i Par. vi, 10), ful- 
filled the functions of high priest. We see in the first 
Book of Kings that not only does the high priest 
exist, but also that he occupies a high position in the 
kingdom of Juda. Who does not know of the capital 
role which Joiada played in the history of Joas whom 
he restores on the throne, usurped by Athalia? The 
sacred author calls him explicitly the high priest (4 
Kings xii, 11). Plelcias, Seraias also carry this title 
(xxii, 4; xxiii, 4; xxv, 18). Moreover, the first Book 
of Paralipomenons (vi.) gives us the list of the high 
priests of the successors to Aaron. When therefore, as 
the rationalistic criticism claims, the sovereign priest- 
hood was unknown before the Captivity, when the 
Levites formed no distinct class from the priests, all 
historical books of the Hebrew Old Testament would 
be the most monstrous fraud that was ever practiced; 
the Levites themselves who accepted this subordina- 
tion to the priests, when the most ancient among them 
could still perfectly remember that before the ruin of 
the temple there existed no distinction between priests 
and Levites, would have been the most simple of men, 
and all the people of Juda, who received as deriving 



56 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

from Moses and as something which was practiced for 
centuries, would have been the most stupid peoples had 
they accepted an institution which previously never 
existed. How could it be possible that old men, who 
had seen the ancient Temple, and deplored the poverty 
of the new, would not have remarked that nothing 
was done any longer as in the ancient Temple. 

Mr. Curtiss, in a book wherein he treats ex professo 
the question of the Mosaic priesthood, has established 
according to the authorized testimony which Franz 
Delitzsch renders to him, that the whole history of 
Israel presupposes a hierarchical distinction between 
the priests and Levites; that this distinction goes back 
to Moses, and that it has existed since the establish- 
ment of the people in Palestine until the ruin of 
Jerusalem; that the books written after the Captivity 
do not favor in any manner the opinion according 
to which the organization of the Aaronic priesthood 
would date from the time of Esdras, and, finally, 
that Deuteronomy contradicts in nothing the other 
books of the Pentateuch concerning not only the 
existence, but also the rights peculiar to the priests 
and Levites.^ 

5. THE ENDOWMENT OF THE CLERGY. 

Mr. Wellhausen does not limit himself indeed to 
deny the Mosaic origin of the priesthood in the family 
of Aaron, he maintains moreover that the Dues due 
to the clergy, according to the Law, are equally a 
recent institution. In antiquity, according to him, 
the sacrifices were essentially sacred repasts to which 
they invited the priests, where there were any. The 

^ S. J. Curtiss, ''The Levitical Priests," Edinburg, 1877. 



HISTORICAL OBJECTIONS. . 5/ 

one who possessed a sanctuary, instituted priests, by 
means of a salary, but he had no legal right to any 
portion of the victim. Deuteronomy commences to 
attribute this to them; the Sacerdotal Code notably 
increased them. As to the forty-eight cities given to the 
Levites (i Kings ii, 12-17), it is a fiction of which 
the first germ is found perhaps in the visions of the 
future Israel by Ezechiel. 

Mr. Wellhausen would like therefore here, as in 
the points we have already examined, to make of the 
second part of the prophecies of Ezechiel one of the 
sources of the legislation of the Pentateuch. Ezechiel 
should have suggested the idea of a part of the Sacer- 
dotal Dues. But the truth is that the second part of 
Ezechiel clearly supposes the Books of Moses. The 
history of the children of Heli confirms in an irrefuta- 
ble manner the existence of the Sacerdotal Dues a 
long time before the Captivity (i Kings ii, 12-17). 
The Books of Kings mention, in the time of Joas, the 
money that was given to priests as prize of the sacri- 
ces for sin and crime (4 Kings xii, 16). The author 
of the ParaHpomenons relates that, under the reign 
of Ezechias, they gave to the priests the tithes and first 
fruits (2 Par. xxxi, 4-6). The offering of the first 
fruits is such a natural thing that it exists still as a 
practice of devotion in many countries. The nations 
whom the Hebrews knew were in the habit to ofifer 
to their deities gifts of the soil; they did this in Chaldea 
and in Egypt. In an Accadian inscription found at 
Birs-Nimrud, near Babylon, an ancient Semitic king 
of Erech, who lived long before Abraham, offers in the 
temple of his god measures of grain, twelve mines 
(about six bushels) of wool, oil, etc. The Egyptian 



58 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

monuments are filled with enumerations of the gifts 
of grain, wine, vegetables, offered in the temples of all 
the cities of the Nile valley. Moses, in fixing what 
the children of Israel should offer to the ministers of 
worship, regulated only ancient customs and which he 
had seen practiced in the kingdom of the Pharaohs. 

As to the existence of Levitical cities, which is 
denied by the Rationalists, it is established by facts. 
The impossibilities which Wellhausen pretends to 
point out, arc not real. The sacred history shows, long 
before the Captivity, that there were sacerdotal cities. 
At Bethsames where we see Levites receive the Ark 
in the time of the Judges (Jos. xxi, i6; i Par. vi, 59; 
I Kings vi, 15), at Anatoth whither Solomon banishes 
Abiathar and where Jeremias was born, who was of the 
sacerdotal family (Jos. xxi, 8; i Par. vi, 59; Jer. i, i,.etc.). 

Hence there is nothing founded in the allegations 
of the Rationalists against the antiquity of the law of 
Moses. It was the liberator of the Hebrews who regu- 
lated the divine worship; it was he (Moses) who insti- 
tuted the ritual of the sacrifices and of the Levites 
and fixed the right of the sacred ministers. Esdras 
by whom the infidels pretend that the Pentateuch was 
written, explicitly attributes the same to Moses: 
"They built an altar to the God of Israel, that they 
might offer holocausts upon it, as it is written in the 
law of Moses, the man of God (I Esdras iii, 1-4). 
Nehemias speaks in the same manner (i, 7; viii, 14; 
xiii, i). 

Hence all the arguments which the infidels allege 
against the Mosaic origin of the Pentateuch are with- 
out value, and the ancient tradition is not shaken by 
modern criticism. The sacred history, far from proving 



THE DIFFERENT NAMES OF GOD. 59 

that the Law is the work of time, a natural develop- 
ment of the Hebrew civilization, establishes, on the 
contrary, that the Mosaic legislation is a divine work. 
It is not the people of God that made the Law; but 
the Law made the people of God. The history of the 
race of Abraham and Jacob is really miraculous. The 
answer of the chaplain of Frederick II of Prussia re- 
mains always true. When this infidel prince asked 
him for a short and decisive proof of the divinity of the 
Scriptures, the chaplain answered by the sole word: 
''Israel." 



CHAPTER IV. 



THE DIFFERENT NAMES OF GOD. 

TO GOD, though in Himself most simple, we 
give different names to express even imper- 
fectly our knowledge of Him. As we cannot com- 
prehend Llis essence in itself, we can know Him only 
through His perfections as they are manifested in crea- 
tures. The first revealed name of God which we meet 
with in Scripture is Elohim. "In the beginning," 
writes Moses, "God (Elohim) created heaven and 
earth." In nearly every verse of the first chapter of 
Genesis the same name occurs. It is in the plural 
number, and according to Genesis is a developed form 
of El, which radically means power. Other scholars 
would derive it froni the Hebrew word "Alah," to 
swear. What is peculiar about the name is that, 



6o DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

though in plural number, it is constantly, when used 
for the true God, joined with verbs and adjectives in 
the singular. And on the other hand, when applied 
to denote false gods, it is invariably united to verbs 
and adjectives in the plural. This marked distinction 
in the use of the name has thoroughly convinced 
some Rationalists of the original monotheism of the 
Hebrew race. 

Another peculiar feature of the name Elohim is, that 
it has a singular Eloah, which, though used by Moses, 
is found in Job and Habacuc, as Pererius points out 
(Comm. in Genesim, t. i, p. ii). Again when Elohim 
is united to a verb in the plural (which occurs, in any 
form, critics say, at most twelve times against some 
two thousand instances for the contrary usage) its 
sense is determined by the word Jehovah which 
accompanies it. This constant use of the name Elohim, 
theologians following the opinion of the Master of 
Sentences uphold, was not without design. By it 
Moses wished, they say, to indicate the Trinity of 
Persons in the Godhead, and by the singular verb to 
teach the unity of Divine nature. 

The name Elohim, however, as being generic, was 
sometimes given to created beings. "In Scripture," 
writes Pererius, ''it is given not only to God, but also 
to angels, to judges, and princes. Since properly 
it signified those who, on account of their great au- 
thority and power, especially in the vindication of 
justice, are objects of fear to others " (Op. cit.). When 
men fell away from the true faith they called their gods 
and their idols Elohim. 

The exclusive use of the name in first chapter of 
Genesis seems to suggest that by divine inspiration 



THE DIFFERENT NAMES OF GOD. 6 1 

it was chosen by Moses to denote the exercise of the 
power and the beneficence of the one true God. 

But the name which the Israelites looked upon 
as the proper name of God was Jehovah. It is derived 
according to Hebraists, from the Hebrew haia '' is," 
and means "He who is." The Jews style it 'Hhe name 
of substance," ''the name of being," "the venerated 
and terrible name,'' "the name reserved or incom- 
municable," "the mysterious name," "the ineffable 
name," "the name tetragrammatical" (literally, the 
name, product of four letters — Hebraism). Jehovah, 
therefore, as Masius, quoted by Cornelius a Lapide says, 
is the same as He " who exists from eternity, who is His 
own essence, and from whom depends the essence of all 
things." So sacred was this name to the Jews that 
it was only the high priest who pronounced it, and 
that amid the most solemn rites. In common dis- 
course or in reading the people substituted the name 
Adonai for Jehovah. Literally Adonai means Lord, 
and this meaning the Septuagint version adopts, trans- 
lating Jehovah by the word kurios, while the Vulgate 
renders it by the word '' Dominus!' Being first re- 
vealed to Moses, the name Jehovah was not known 
to the Patriarchs. To them God revealed Himself as 
the Almighty (El Shaddai), for thus He spoke to 
Moses: "I am the Lord that appeared to Abraham 
to Isaac and to Jacob by the name God of Almighty 
(El Shaddai), and my name Adonai (Jehovah) I did 
not show them." (Ex. vi. 2-3). 

Modern infidels have undertaken to prove that 
Jehovah stands for the sun, which in Grecian and Phe- 
nician mythologies is called, according to the different 
seasons, by different names. They report that the 



62 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Grecian oracle of Apollo at Claros said: "Jao is the 
greatest of the gods; he is styled Hades in winter, 
Zeus in spring, the sun in summer, and the tender 
Jao in autumn." This story, however, about the 
Grecian oracle has been rejected by all learned critics, 
among them, Gesenius and Jablonsky. The fabrication 
they attribute to one of the early judaizing Gnostics. 
But in itself the story is puerile and sophistical. We 
prove from the authentic teaching and religion of the 
Hebrews, as far back as the time of Moses and Abra- 
ham, that they worshiped Jehovah as the one and only 
true God; but, notwithstanding this evidence, oppo- 
nents insist that for our proof we must go to Phenician 
and Grecian mythologies, even though these have no 
connection whatever in time or in place with the sub- 
ject of our thesis; or, what the Greeks and Phenicians 
thought of their gods in the beginning of the Christian 
era, is to be the basis of proof for what the Hebrews 
thought about Jehovah in the time of Abraham. 
There is no need of enlarging further on the absurd 
in such reasoning. 

But so far were the Hebrews from worshipping 
the sun that they were forbidden to do so under the 
penalty of being stoned, as we read in Deuteronomy. 
And on the other hand they were taught to sing, 
''Praise ye the Lord (Jehovah) from heavens . 
praise ye Him, O sun and moon; praise ye Him, all ye 
stars and light" (Ps. cxlviii, 1-3). 

Another name generically used in Scripture for 
God is the word El. Primarily it means power. 
Thus in Genesis Laban says to Jacob: 'Ht is in my power 
(El) to return the evil," and Moses speaking to the 
people, says: "May thy sons and daughters be given 



THE DIFFERENT NAMES OF GOD. 63 

to another people ... and may there be no 
strength (El) in the Land" (Deut. xxviii, 32). But 
generally El, when applied to God, takes an adjective 
denoting the one or other of the divine attributes. 
Hence, as we have seen, He revealed Himself to Abra- 
ham as El Shaddai, that is, God all-powerful and mu- 
nificent (Shaddai), while He revealed Himself to Mel- 
chisadech as "the most High" (Elyon). Of Abraham 
it is written, "I lift up my hand to the Lord God, the 
most High (El Elyon), the possessor of heaven and 
earth " (Gen. xiv, 22). 

Besides the names just enumerated and given by 
St. Jerome, he also adds El Sabaoth, that is, accord- 
ing to Aquila, "the God of armies." Strictly speaking 
Sabaoth is not a name but a surname, hence says Corne- 
lius a Lapide, "it is always united to some other name of 
God." Then there is the J a, which is an abbreviated 
form of Jehovah and is one of the component words 
of Halleluia, made up by hallelu, praise ye, and ya, the 
Lord. 



CHAPTER V. 



THE FATHERS AND THE MOSAIC COSMOGONT. 

ALTHOUGH the authority of the Fathers extends 
only to matters of faith and morals, Christian 
teachers have always maintained that outside the 
sphere of the divinely revealed religious doctrines, 
there exists yet a vast realm of profane or purely 
natural sciences — a boundless field in which the hu- 
man mina may freely exercise itself. This privilege 
the Fathers have exercised on many important occa- 
sions, especially on points growing out of the first 
chapter of Genesis. 

Notwithstanding the Fathers were deprived of 
divine inspiration in explaining the cosmogony of the 
Bible, yet they knew that the inspired writers were 
personally not exempt from the erroneous views of 
their contemporaries on matters purely profane, and 
though they knew it was not the object of divine 
revelation to enrich purely profane knowled'ge with 
direct instructions on purely scientific subjects, yet 
they fully believed and taught, that the Spirit of Truth 
could not sanction with His authority any such error 
on even purely profane matters, in the writings which 
He inspired. 

The very nature and importance of the first chapter 
of Genesis, in the work of the Fathers, necessitated 
(64) 



THE FATHERS AND THE MOSAIC COSMOGONY. 6$ 

their touching on science when explaining the cos- 
mogony of the Bible. But, neither the patristic tra- 
ditions nor the Church have fixed the scientific sense 
of the first chapter of Genesis. In matters of science, 
the Fathers spoke as private Doctors. "The authority 
of the Fathers, as also the authority of the Church, 
extends only to matters oi/aitA^nd morals, and truths 
essentially connected with them. Consequently, purely 
scientific views of the Fathers have no greater value 
than the scientific principles on which they rest. 
For sufficient reasons, we may reject them, however 
unanimously they may be held by the Fathers."^ 

How far do we deviate from the teaching of the 
Fathers? Do we adhere to the rules laid down by 
them on the meaning of the word ''Day"? These 
questions can be briefly answered by saying that, the 
explanations of the Fathers are completely in accord 
with the discoveries of modern science — the Catholic 
exegesis has never changed in principle. 

I. IMPORTANCE OF THE FIRST CHAPTER OF GENESIS. 

The first chapter of Genesis is a pen picture of the 
visible crovv^ning glory of Almighty God and His won- 
derful works, as manifested in the creation of heaven 
and earth, the sun, moon and stars, the plants, animals 
and man. It is a worthy frontispiece to the inspired 
writings, and shows the grandeur, sublimity, order, 
harmony, and completeness of God's works; an awe- 
inspiring, withal ravishing manifestation of His power 
and glory, and solicitude for man. It is at the same 
time the basis of theology — the fundamental dogmas 



^ Dr. J. B. Heinrich, " Dogmatische Theologie," vol. I, p. 8io. 
D. B.-5 



66 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

of religion — unity of God — creation out of nothing, 
or rather out of what did not exist before. Provi- 
dence, unity of the human species, dependence of man 
on his Creator; also a complete annihilation of the 
errors of the ancients — a condemnation of polytheism, 
naturalism, and materialism. 

The importance of the BibHcal cosmogony has drawn 
forth many theological and philosophical speculations 
concerning its origin, each epoch considering it from 
its own point of view. In our days it has become 
more interesting from the fact, that science assumes 
sponsorship and dictatorship of all natural phenomena. 
At the beginning of Christianity, attention was directed 
to it, chiefly from the theological side; this the Chris- 
tian Doctors awakened by their masterly logic and 
eloquence. The earliest of the venerable teachers 
enraptured by admiration of the first chapter of Genesis, 
clearly pointed out the wonderful beauty, power and 
majesty displayed in the creation of the visible universe, 
in their controversies with pagans and heretics, show- 
ing the superiority of the Biblical cosmogony over 
the mythological and philosophical cosmogonies of the 
Greeks, Romans and Gnostics. 

St. Theophilus of Antioch, who after his conversion 
from polytheism to Christianity, had become bishop 
of that city, speaks with fervor and enthusiasm of the 
account of creation, in the most ancient work on the 
hexsemeron, handed down to us from the Fathers. 
He comments on the first chapter of Genesis, to some 
length, in his defence of Christianity against the pagan 
y\utolycus, and devotes the greater part of the second 
book of his ''Apology" to enumeration of the beauties 
of the Mosaic cosmogony; so clear, so precise, and 



THE FATHERS AND THE MOSAIC COSMOGONY. 6/ 

SO convincing are his arguments, that pagan errors 
dissipate themselves before the exposition of the truth. 

2. THE WORK OF THE FATHERS. 

The ancient systems of cosmogony had, in turn, 
raised the problem of the origin of things, and diverse 
philosophies followed in explanation; they being only 
ingenious or rough attempts at solution. But the 
Book of God — the Bible — had given its own, and the 
Fathers desired to point out its superiority over all 
other systems of cosmogony. The pagans lulled 
thus far by the poetic imaginations of Hesoid and Ovid, 
and the Greeks misled by the philosophies of Plato, of 
Zenon, of Epicurus and of Lucretius, they had to pre- 
sent the dogma of a God, free, almighty, eternal, and 
unique Creator of heaven and earth; and to the Mani- 
cheans, prepossessed with the idea that the natural 
creation was bad and absolutely unworthy of the Deity, 
they had to justify the marvelous beauty and adaption 
of this superhuman work, and make them behold there- 
in its relations with the supernatural world and the 
life of the soul. 

This is the work which the Fathers accomplished; 
necessarily an arduous and unremitting task, considering 
the subtle theories of the ancient philosophers and 
poets, and the crude views of the unlearned and igno- 
rant classes, which had to be overcome. Bossuet 
summed up the teaching of those champions of truth, in 
a wonderful manner, in a page of his book — ''Discourse 
on the Universal History" — which is substantially a 
translation of their own words: 

''The conduct of God in the creation makes us see 
that all proceeds immediately from His hand. The 



68 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

nations and philosophers who have beUeved that the 
earth, mixed with water, and assisted, if you wish, by 
the heat of the sun, had produced by itself, by its own 
fecundity, the plants and the animals, did deceive them- 
selves very much. The Scripture gives us to under- 
stand that the elements are sterile, if the word of God 
does not render them fruitful. Neither the earth, nor 
the water, nor the air, would ever have produced the 
plants or animals which we behold, if God, who had 
made and prepared the matter, had not formed them 
by His all-powerful will, and if He had not given to 
each thing the seeds proper to multiply themselves 
in all the centuries. Those who behold the plants take 
their birth and growth from the heat of the sun, 
might believe that it is their creator; but the Scripture 
tells us that the earth clothed with herbs and all kinds 
of plants before the sun had been created, in order that 
we might perceive that all depends upon God. This 
great Workman was pleased to create the light, even 
before reducing it to the form which He has given to 
it in the sun, and in the stars, because He wished to 
teach us that these grand and magnificent lights, of 
which they wished to make deities, had not by them- 
selves neither the precious and shining matter of 
which they have been composed, nor the wonderful 
form to which we behold them reduced. Finally, the 
account of creation, such as it is made by Moses, re- 
veals to us that great secret of real philosophy, that 
in God alone resides the fecundity and the absolute 
power. ... If, after the established order in 
nature, one thing depends upon the other, for instance, 
the rise and the growth of the plants, of the sun's heat, 
it is because this same God who has made all the parts 



THE FATHERS AND THE MOSAIC COSMOGONY. 69 

of the universe, wished to unite them among one 
another, and make shining His Wisdom by this won- 
derful connection."^ • 

3. THE FATHERS COULD NOT EXPLAIN THE BIBLICAL 

COSMOGONY WITHOUT TOUCHING ON SCIENCE. 

Evidently, it was impossible for the Christian Doc- 
tors to explain the Biblical cosmogony, without touch- 
ing on science, for Genesis itself, necessarily touches 
on it. To combat the pagan philosophers, they had 
to enter upon their physical theories, and to root out 
the worship of the astres, they had to touch on astron- 
omy; and to teach the faithful how to lead a good life, 
they had to draw useful lessons from the works of crea- 
tion. The preacher had to become more or less a 
naturalist, and present to the people God's solicitude 
for man as manifested in the fruitfulness of the earth 
in plants, animals, and fish in the waters, and clothe 
these illustrations with fitting anecdotes and moral 
sentiments. Man has always shown much interest 
and curiosity about the things of nature, especially the 
animal kingdom, and this was shown among other 
things, at the dawn of Christianity, by the singular 
but significant books entitled: ''Bestiarii." Marvel not 
then at the motives which prompted the Christian 
teachers to enter the domain of natural science, though 
their teaching before all was dogmatic and moral. 

4. IN EXPLAINING HUMAN THINGS THE FATHERS WERE 

DEPRIVED OF DIVINE REVELATION. 

By entering the domain of profane science, the 
Fathers no longer had the aid of revelation, and had 

^ Bossuet, "Discours sur I'Histoire Universelle " 2, part, chap. i. 



70 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

to depend on the light of their own intelHgence. 
There is a revealed religion, but not a revealed science. 
This is so true, that the scientific ideas which we meet 
in the works of the Fathers are mainly borrowed, not 
from the Bible, but from the Greek philosophers and 
other profane sources. As already noted, God did not 
wish to teach us in Holy Scripture, physics, chemistry, 
biology, astronomy, or in fact, any abstruse science. 
His only purpose was to give us the means to save our 
souls and inherit the kingdom of heaven. On this 
point, St. Thomas observes very correctly, that when 
the Bible speaks of nature, it is mentioned inciden- 
tally, and it conforms itself to the popular language: 
''One must consider that Moses spoke to an ignorant 
people and that, condescending to its weakness, he 
proposed to it only the things which fell clearly under 
the senses." 

The first chapter of Genesis forms an exception 
to this, in one sense, for, although it is susceptible to 
different interpretations, its subjects seem to imply in 
themselves great outlines and a real scientific founda- 
tion. But that which it teaches, though important 
in itself, is little, comparatively speaking, to the vast 
domain of science. Indeed, the whole sums itself up 
in the following points, confirmed by geological and 
paleontological discoveries, that in the creative work 
there is an ascending gradation. God created matter 
first, and afterwards He drew forth the world from 
chaos; He produced the lower forms of life first, then 
higher beings, rising from the less perfect to the more 
perfect, in a regular ascending scale; the mineral king- 
dom, the vegetable kingdom, the animal kingdom, and 
lastly, the human kingdom above all. Outside of this 



THE FATHERS AND THE MOSAIC COSMOGONY. /I 

record, Moses teaches us nothing precise about the 
nature of things. 

5. IN MATTERS OF SCIENCE THE FATHERS SPOKE AS 
PRIVATE DOCTORS. 

When the Fathers had occasion to discuss scientific 
points, they did not assume to have found any special 
Hght in the Sacred Books, aside of the dogma of 
creation, consequently they spoke of these things, not 
as depositaries and witnesses of Catholic tradition, but 
as private Doctors; therefore, their assertions have no 
binding effect, as they are the expressions of indi- 
vidrials making no claim to scientific knowledge, and 
for which the Church does not hold herself responsible, 
though in matters of faith and morals, their unanimous 
testimony carries authority with it. Providence raised 
these great men to propagate Christianity, and preserve 
and defend its doctrines in their purity and integrity, 
and not to teach physics or chemistry, or delve in 
geology. We do not find a Copernicus, nor a Cuvier 
among them; their science partook of the times in 
which the^^ lived, consequently it was defective. 

6. THE ACCESSORY BECOMES THE PRINCIPAL. 

The cosmogony of the Fathers, nevertheless, de- 
serves more than a passing notice, not so much from 
its scientific value, but on account of the use some 
wish to make of it in our times to ridicule the Bible 
and Catholicism. 

Now, that what was in the early centuries of the 
Church the accessory in the first chapter of Genesis, has 
become the principal in the present century. The won- 
derful progress of astronomy, physics and geology, has 



72 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Stimulated general attention to the first chapter of 
Genesis. Is it in accord with modern discoveries? 
The faithful will answer Yes; the infidel will say No. 
In support of their allegations they will refer to the 
exegesis of the Fathers. When the Christian savants 
affirm that the cosmogony of the Hebrews, well under- 
stood, embraces a series of successive epochs, during 
which were formed the diverse layers of the earth with 
the fossils which characterize them, the enemies of 
religion cry out at the newness of this interpretation, 
and accuse us of holding opinions contrary to ecclesi- 
astical tradition. 

7. NEITHER THE PATRISTIC TRADITION NOR THE 

CHURCH HAS FIXED THE SCIENTIFIC SENSE 

OF THE FIRST CHAPTER OF GENESIS. 

Hence it is important to give a general view of what 
is the real cosmogony of the Fathers, and what duties it 
imposes on the exegetist of our times. Contrary to the 
general belief of the enemies of religion, we shall prove 
that the patristic tradition no more than the authority of 
the Church, has never fixed the scientific meaning of the 
first chapter of Genesis. The Fathers, as well as the 
theologians who succeeded them, were not unanimous 
on this point, some understanding it in one sense 
and some in another. Consequently, there does not 
exist, strictly speaking, a traditional interpretation 
of the Mosaic cosmogony, binding on the Catholic. 
The exegetist of our times has the right to choose 
the one which appears to him the most conformable 
to the accounts of real science. And so far as the an- 
cient Church writers are not in accord with the manner 
of explaining the Mosaic cosmogony in our days, it 
is because they found themselves in face of undemon- 



THE FATHERS AND THE MOSAIC COSMOGONY. 73 

strated hypotheses, and had no authorized commen- 
taries, as in modern times, to furnish the necessary 
points on geology and paleontology. Theology, in our 
century, can march only in the track, and conform 
itself to the true principles, by interpreting the word 
of God by the aid of the Hght which science furnishes 
to it, just as it has the duty to profit by the archaeolog- 
ical, historical and geographical discoveries, to explain 
obscure or even badly understood passages of Scrip- 
ture, so also, it is obliged to make use of scientific 
discoveries, when they are certain, in order to fix the 
meaning of passages which they can clear up, so far as 
being unfaithful to the traditions of the Church, it 
follows only the example of the past. 

8. DIFFERENT OPINIONS ON THE FIRST CHAPTER OF 

GENESIS. 

Certainly, it cannot be our object to enter into 
details about the ideas of the Fathers regarding the 
Biblical cosmogony, as each school held particular 
views, and we can only summarize the many points at 
issue. 

That what strikes us in the first place, is, the diver- 
sity of opinion on the scientific interpretation of this 
chapter, while there is perfect accord on the dogmatic 
sense of the same, so much do they differ on the man- 
ner, mode and details of creation, that they instituted 
two opposing schools on the leading point, namely: 
the time the creation lasted. Not only the Jewish 
writer Philo, but also many of the Levantine and Latin 
Fathers, particularly Clement of Alexandria, Origen, 
and Procopius, considered those six days not as ordi- 
nary days of twenty-four hours, but as periods of time 



74 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

of unknown duration, while others held the opinion 
that creation took place instantaneously. The great 
St. Augustine says: "What kind of Days they are, is 
either most difificult or impossible for us to guess; how 
much more so to decide." The diversity of opinion 
on all particular questions was even much greater. We 
may mention here, that the fame of the Alexandrian 
school for profane knowledge was world wide. Indeed, 
it may be said, that all the early Christian teachers, 
not only studied the Bible and traditions of the Church, 
intelligently and profoundly, but also the writings of 
profane, even pagan, authors. St. Jerome, in his 
letter to the orator Magnus, gives the names of many 
Christian teachers, from the days of St. Paul to his own 
time, of whom he says, "that one knows not what to 
admire more, their profane science or their knowledge 
of the Sacred Scriptures." 

9. WHAT ARE THE RESULTS FROM THIS ABSENCE OF 
ACCORD AMONG THE FATHERS. 

Even if these venerable writers were in accord on 
the scientific explanation of the origin of the world, 
we would not be obliged to accept their interpretation, 
because science is not a deposit preserved by tradition, 
like the revealed truth. We must believe, in matters 
of faith, quod semper quod ubique. We must accept 
in the scientific domain, the sure progress brought 
about in the series of centuries through the accumula- 
tion of observations and experiments. We are no 
more bound to the scientific ideas of the Fathers than 
are the savants of to-day to those of the savants of 
former times. We can reject them without losing 



THE FATHERS AND THE MOSAIC COSMOGONY. 75 

respect for their authors, with the same Hberty con- 
temporary astronomers reject the system of Ptolemy. 

But when the exegetist has preserved his independ- 
ence, even though the Fathers were in accord, with 
much greater reason has he preserved the right to form 
a personal opinion in the midst of conflicting views. 
Even the theologian has the right to choose the opin- 
ion w^hich pleases him most in dogmatic matter, when 
the ancient tradition is divided and unsettled, so long 
as the Chuich has not given her opinion or judgment 
on any side of the question in dispute. Now, the infal- 
lible authority has never expressed itself on the scien- 
tific interpretation of the Biblical cosmogony, nor on 
the question of the simultaneous creation. Hence 
we may say, it is a self-proved fact, that the Catholic 
can explain the Mosaic cosmogony by giving to it the 
meaning which appears to him the most conformable 
to the accounts of true science, under the sole con- 
dition to observe the rules of Hermaneutic and of the 
interpretation of the Sacred Books. 

After stating the independence and rights of the 
exegetist in scientific matters, let us now examine the 
points we have deviated from patristic teaching: 

10. HOW FAR HAVE WE DEVIATED FROM PATRISTIC 
TEACHING? 

That which forms the basis of the present question 
is not in the details themselves, because the Fathers 
are not in accord, but in the principles which they 
followed, and wdiich are common to all. These prin- 
ciples embody the following: We must make use of 
reason, of science in its sure accounts to interpret the 
Mosaic cosmogony. The motive, for instance which 



76 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBL-E. 

urged the Alexandrian school to take up the question 
of simultaneous creation, was to reconcile the Bible 
with the then existing philosophical systems which 
appeared consistent with reason. Most of the ecclesi- 
astical writers have personally supported their indi- 
vidual views on some points, just as the science of 
their times directed and assured them. St. Augustine 
for example, proclaimed forcibly the necessity of 
putting the exegesis in accord with what is true in 
science: ''Acquired by reason and experiment." 

II. WE ADHERE TO THE RULES LAID DOWN BY THE 
FATHERS. 

The principle of our teachers in faith is also ours. 
When we are not in accord with them in details, it is 
not because the principle has changed, but because 
science has advanced — outgrown its environments. 
We do what they would have done had they lived in our 
times. They accepted what the savants had taught 
them, just as we accept what the savants are teaching 
to-day. Hence, there is only a change in the interpre- 
tation, because there is a change in science, and this 
change cannot be imputed to theology but to science 
itself, which by its nature is progressive and searching, 
changing, remodeling or rnodifying former hypotheses; 
adding something new, or refuting what had been 
generally accepted demonstrated facts yesterday, by 
experiments to-day. Of course, it does not enter 
one's mind to reproach science for its rapid strides and 
every day discoveries, but why should scientists with- 
hold their approval and forbid us to make use of these 
progressive changes, because we do not abandon our 



THE FATHERS AND THE MOSAIC COSMOGONY. J J 

traditions, that which we hold fundamental and essen- 
tial and because we continue to apply the principles 
which have guided the interpreters of Holy Scripture, 
at all times. For, the more knowledge of nature is 
diffused the more clear is the Sacred Text to us, but 
its authority does not change; it is always the same. 

We can also observe, that not only do we preserve 
the rules laid down by our Fathers, but that we keep 
an important part of. their explanations, though as 
already stated, we are not obliged to accept their 
scientific ideas, inasmuch as they were not savants by 
profession, the great majority being distinguished for 
intelHgence and exalted virtue, but the penetration of 
their keen intellects enabled them to discover in the 
Sacred Books truths ignored by the common people, 
which are confirmed by the discoveries of our age. 

12. MEANING OF THE WORD DAY AND TEACHING OF 
THE FATHERS. 

Among the many truths handed down to us from 
the Fathers, let us point to the one that is necessarily 
connected with our subject, namely, the meaning we 
must attach to the word day, as given in Genesis. 
Contemporary exegetists who accept the results of 
geology, maintain that the word cannot be taken in its 
literal meaning, that is for a duration of twenty-four 
hours, but in a figurative sense, simply signifying time. 
Now, contemporary exegetists are not the authors of 
this opinion, for we find this already advanced by the 
Fathers. 

True, none of the Fathers teach expressly that the 
six days of creation were periods of time, though St. 
Justin and St. Gregory, of Nazianz, admit a long inter- 



78 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

val between the creation of matter and that of Hght. 
Clement of Alexandria, Origen, and Procopius, con- 
sidered those six days not as ordinary days of twenty- 
four hours, while the words of the Venerable Bede can 
be readily taken to mean periods of time of indefinite 
length. 

St, Augustine and the Venerable Bede say that the 
seventh day had no evening, but neither of them had 
foreseen what is called epochal days of creation. All 
the efforts that have been made to interpret some of 
the texts of the great Bishop of Hippo to the latter 
sense, is fruitless. How could he afhrm that the six 
clays of creation must be taken in the sense of 
long periods of time when he taught instantaneous 
creation? However, we find in the writings of 
some of the Fathers a particular emphasis on the 
w^ord day as employed in passages of the Bible, to 
mean an indefinite period of time, but they could not 
advance this view in their days and conform to the 
universal interpretation of the first chapter of Genesis. 
Fifteen hundred years have passed without a change 
in the literal interpretation, and no doubt, many of the 
Fathers, conformably to their principles, would have 
adopted the system of epochal days, had they lived in 
a later age. 

As to the points of detail it matters little, but it is 
certain that the famous school of Alexandria, in the 
Orient, and a large number of the Fathers of the Occi- 
dent, with St. Augustine at their head, have maintained 
that the word " day," as occurring so often in Holy 
Scripture, must not be understood in its literal sense, 
but rather in its figurative sense, though they have 
not explained it in the same manner as we do. Hence, 



THE FATHERS AND THE MOSAIC COSMOGONY. 79 

we do not innovate by interpreting the word in a meta- 
phorical sense. 

Moreover, some of the reasons alleged by the 
Fathers for establishing their opinions on the word 
day, may be summed up in the words of Origen; that 
the Bible itself gives us to understand that the Genesi- 
cal days are not ordinary days — solar days, because 
it teaches itself that during the first three days the 
sun did not exist. We have the right to couple his 
words with those of St. Augustine, that the word 
" day" in Scriptural language does not designate a 
space of twenty-four hours, because at the beginning 
of the second chapter of Genesis, it designates the 
whole period of creation: ''These are the generations 
of the heaven and the earth when they were created, 
in the day that the Lord God made the heaven and the 
earth, and every plant of the field before it springing 
up in the earth"'" (Gen. ii, 4). 

13. THE EXPLANATIONS OF THE FATHERS ARE COM- 
PLETELY IN ACCORD WITH MODERN DISCOVERIES. 

The Fathers not only furnish us reasons which are 
favorable to the discoveries of modern science, but 
really their explanations are in accord with them. 
Most of the savants of our day admit that the universe 
existed first in an informal state; that it was only suc- 
cessively that matter first transformed itself, and pro- 
duced the diverse creatures which compose the world 
to-day. 

This is the opinion of 'St. Ephrem, St. Basil, St. 
Gregory of Nazianze, St. Gregory of Nyssa, St. Am- 
brose, Severinus Gabalis, and many others. Although 
St. Augustine admits simultaneous creation, he explains 



80 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

it in certain passages of his writings in terms which 
one might consider befitting a modern treatise on the 
origin of things. In first Book on Genesis against 
the Manicheans, he says: '''At the beginning God 
created the heaven and the earth.' Under the name 
of heaven and earth is designated every creature made 
and produced by God. The creature is thus called by 
the name of visible things, on account of the weakness 
of the unlearned ones, who are so Httle apt to understand 
the visible things. Matter has, therefore, been created 
first in a confusive and informal state, in order that the 
individual beings and which have a form might be 
drawn from this; this is, I believe, what the Greeks call 
chaos. . . . This informal matter, which God has 
drawn from nothing, has therefore been called first 
heaven and earth, and it is written, ' In the beginning 
God created heaven and earth,' not because it was this 
already (heaven and earth), but because it was destined 
to become this. When we consider the seed of a tree, 
we say it contains the roots, the stem, the branches— 
the fruits and the leaves, not because they are there, 
but because they should proceed from it. It is in this 
sense that it is said, ' In the beginning God created 
the heaven and the earth,' that is, the seed of the 
heaven and of the earth, when the matter of heaven 
and earth was yet confounded (in one whole); because 
it was certain that the heaven and the earth should 
go forth from this; this matter is called already (by 
anticipation) the heaven and the earth. . . . We 
find in the Holy Scriptures numberless examples of 
similar locutions." 

Thus it is seen that a great number of the Fathers, 
both of the Orient and the Occident, are in accord on 



THE FATHERS AND THE MOSAIC COSMOGONY. 8 1 

the texts of Scripture relating the origin of the world, 
with our modern savants. Some of the Fathers, like 
some of the savants, did not believe that the sun was, 
properly speaking, created on the first day, though 
the details which they give on this subject are wanting 
in exactness, on account of the prevailing ignorance 
of their times about the real nature of the Hght, never- 
theless, it is conceded, that they approached theories 
commonly admitted by the moderns. 

14. THE CATHOLIC EXEGESIS HAS NEVER CHANGED IN 
PRINCIPLE. 

We could add other points of detail to this subject, 
if we thought it necessary to extend our space, but 
believe we have given all that is sufficient for the 
purpose we had in view,. It seems to us that we 
have shown that the CathoHc exegesis has never 
changed in principle, and that it is the same to-day it 
has been in the past. It beholds in Holy Scripture 
the word of God itself, but put down after the meaning 
and manner of men, and consequently so expressed in 
human language. At all times Christians have made use 
of the sciences to interpret the Bible; every scientific 
discovery throws new light upon some point of the 
Sacred Text. The Fathers made use of estabHshed 
truths when the science of their times permitted them. 
We continue their work by making use of the science 
of our times, and Hke them and with them, we beheve, 
that, '' No real discord can exist betzvecji reason and 
faithr 



D. B.— 6 



CHAPTER VI. 



THE HEX^EMERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DATS. 

MAN having been created last of the visible world, 
he could not have witnessed the acts of creation. 
The tradition of the ancients, whether civilized, semi- 
civilized or savage, agree in the main points with the 
inspired text. Since man was unaided by science, 
through the long years of his existence, it was natural 
he should accept the Mosaic account of the creation 
as he finds it in Genesis. 

The time has come when man must take a more 
comprehensive view of creation. The progress of the 
natural sciences makes it essential that one should 
inquire into the interpretation of the Mosaic account 
and see wherein it falls short of the demands of science. 
In the present chapter we review the objections made 
against the literal system, and with such tangible evi- 
dence in the strata and in the fossils imbedded therein, 
we can no longer accept this system as being in har- 
mony with science. 

The study of geology shows us that our globe is 
composed of superposed strata or layers, distinguished 
from one another by the elements and different fossils 
which are proper to each. To explain the existence 
of these layers and fossils, the learned have instituted 
four principal systems: The Literal system, system of 
Intervals, Ideal system and the Concordistic system. 
(82) 



V THE HEX.EMERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. St, 

The Literal System consists in understanding 
the Sacred Text in the proper and hteral sense. It 
maintains that God created the earth as it is, with its 
plants and petrified animals. Hence, this system takes 
all the words of Genesis literally and substantially as 
they are written, without change of meaning. Con- 
sequently, it adheres to the interpretation that the 
universe was created in six ordinary days of twenty- 
four hours each, of an evening and morning — a night 
and day. This system is still maintained by some 
rare theologians or exegetists, and by the majority of 
the unlearned, who consider the fossils "freaks of 
nature." 

I. CRITICISM OF THE LITERAL SYSTEM. 

Geologists of the present day are unanimous in 
rejecting this system. Whoever has seen with his own 
eyes, or has given the least study to geology and 
paleontology, will not hesitate to discard this system 
as untenable in the face of such unquestionable testi- 
mony. If Holy Writ did not abound in figurative 
expressions; if it did not convey meanings hard to be un- 
derstood; if it did not use words, expressions and forms 
of speech peculiar to the age, country and people to 
whom they were addressed, and if it were free from the 
criticism of science, on matters pertaining to nature, 
then there would be good reason to adhere to its literal 
meaning. But the Bible imposes no theory of creation; 
it does declare this universe not to be uncaused and 
orphaned; it asserts Creation, Providence and Father- 
hood; but how matter was created, and how, after its 
creation, the divine agency was correlated to it in pro- 
ducing new forms of life and beauty, Genesis does not 



84 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

declare. God has given to man faith and reason as a 
means of reading the Book of Revelation and the Book 
of Nature. He can exercise the former in reading the 
Book of Nature, without losing the latter in the Book 
of Revelation. He must take into consideration the 
mistakes of translators and copyists; and that on 
matters purely scientific or profane, they are men- 
tioned only incidentally. Therefore, the Church has 
never by solemn decisions of general councils, or by 
definitions ex cathedra^ interfered in settling purely 
scientific questions. 

Although we should ordinarily preserve the proper 
sense of the words of Holy Writ in its integrity, it is 
certain that we must understand some words in a 
hgurative or metaphorical sense, when, if taken in their 
literal acceptation would, strictly speaking, convey 
an erroneous meaning. Now, this is the case with the 
literal system, because geology and paleontology prove 
that the world in its actual state was not produced 
within an ordinary week of six days, and that many 
centuries must have elapsed before animal life, and 
before man appeared upon the earth. 

2. GENESIS ABOUNDS IN FIGURATIVE EXPRESSIONS. 

The first chapter of Genesis abounds in figurative 
expressions, and must be explained as such by all the 
exegetists without exception. Even the adherents 
of the literal system are obliged to admit a great 
number of figurative locutions following the record 
of the days of Creation: ''So the heavens and the earth 
were finished, and all the furniture (or ornament — 
'ornatus,' as the Vulgate has it) of them. 
These are the generations of the heavens and the earth, 



THE HEX^MERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 85 

when they were created in the day that the Lord God 
made the heavens and the earth." 

3. THE MEANING OF THE HEBREW WORD YOM. 

There is no one conversant with Holy Scripture 
but will agree it is by metaphor that God is, at times, 
represented expressing words; seeing what He did is 
good, calHng the hght day, and the darkness night. 
Science shows us that the Hebrew word Yom — day — 
is also employed in a figurative sense. Certainly, 
Moses does not designate before the fourth day the 
ordinary succession of day and night, because the sun 
did not yet shine in the horizon; hence, it is taken in 
a figurative sense, and so is the latter part of the 
account. With our more accurate use of language 
it might appear strange that the inspired writer would 
-make use of the word day for an indefinite period, 
and yet, the word day is frequently used in our lan- 
guages in an analogous manner. Modern languages 
are rich in such expressions: duration, epoch, age, 
time, etc., but the Hebrew has only the word Yom, to 
express both a day, and an indefinite period of time. 

By following the dictates of reason, we must con- 
clude it was unnecessary that God should employ 
twenty-four hours to create the light, twenty-four 
hours to create the stars, the planets or the animals; 
an instantaneous act of His will was sufficient for Him 
to bring forth all these things, as God could not em- 
ploy an entire day's work to give existence to every 
one of the species of creatures, which appeared during 
the Genesical days; therefore, there is good reason to 
beheve that the word day is figurative, and denotes 
here an epoch of time. 



86 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

The Arabs call a period of time Jaumun, which word 
is evidently related to the Hebrew Yom. That what 
proves the word Yom to mean here an epoch (as we 
shall show more fully when we come to explain the 
Hexsemeron) is, that the earth contains in its bosom 
remains of plants and animals beyond computation, and 
that the geological layers are immense graveyards 
where the dead are heaped up: — 

The earth has gathered to her breast again 
And yet again, the millions that were born 
Of her unnumbered and unremembered tribes. 

It is not possible to preserve to the word Yom the 
meaning of twenty-four hours duration, except in sup- 
posing that God did create in the fossil state those num- 
berless remains of plants and animals found in the strata. 
Such a hypothesis cannot be accepted by one that has 
studied geology. We cannot suppose that all these 
fossils had been deposited in the terrestrial layers since 
the creation of man: i. Because we should then have to 
give to man a much greater antiquity; 2. Because in the 
ancient layers there is nowhere a trace of man, which 
proves that the animals which have left their remains 
had lived before the creation of man. 

4. TESTIMONY OF THE SEDIMENTARY GROUNDS. 

The sedimentary grounds or deposits have a thick- 
ness of many miles. By adding the thicktiess of each 
layer together, where they are the most complete, if 
not the most developed, will aggregate from 105,000 
to 120,000 feet. The thickness of the united Palsezoic 
formations alone has l)een estimated at 40,000 feet. Of 
course, this estimate is wanting in actual measurement, 
but we can give reliable data for a few well known 



THE HEX/EMERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 8/ 

formations. One division of the Permerian system, 
the RothHegende, is divided at Mansfeld and Thuringia, 
Germany, into three layers, which are respectively 
500, 800, 200 and 80-300 feet thick. The Vosges 
sandstone, one stratum of the three divisions, in the 
Triassic system, is 1200 feet thick; another is 150 feet, 
and in some locaHties of the Vosges, others are over 
400 feet thick. 

5. MICROSCOPIC REMAINS IN THE CHALK AND LIME- 
STONE FORMATIONS. 

We think enough has been said to show that the 
theory of the formation of these strata since the advent 
of man, may be set aside as untenable. But if we are 
to suppose that the formation took place in pre- 
adamite ages, the theory that only six days had elapsed 
before the creation of man, must also fall to the ground. 
We would have to admit in this case, that the millions 
and miUions of plants and animals imbedded in the ter- 
restrial layers, were created in fossilized form; and that 
species and whole kinds, like the tribolites,^ which 
characterize the primary and disappear in the secondary 
grounds, have had a like creation, or like the ammon- 
ites,^ which characterize the secondary and no longer 
appear in the Tertiary. The multitudinous plants of 



^ An ordinary group of articulated animals which existed in the 
Paleozic period, and have been extinct since the close of the Carbon- 
iferous. It is conceded by all that their nearest representatives are 
the horse crabs. 

2 So-called from their resemblance to a ram's horn. One of the 
fossil shells of an extensive genus of extinct cephalopodous mollusks 
(cuttle fishes) of the iamilj ammonztldc^, coiled in a plain spiral 
and chambered within, like the shell of the existing nautilus, to 
which the ammonites were allied. 



88 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

the coal measure, and the countless shells which form 
the Cretaceous grounds, the nummulites^ of the Ter- 
tiary, or the debris of crinoides,^ which form the lime- 
stone, etc., are solely lusus naturce — mere freaks of 
nature — cannot for a moment be entertained. 

In order to be more explicit in details, we will add, 
that the Cretaceous grounds or composition of chalk, 
form the soil of a considerable part of Asia, Northern 
America, Europe, and especially France — in the 
neighborhood of Picardie, Champagne and Paris (Men- 
don Bongival). It sometimes attains a thickness of 
many hundred feet, and is almost entirely composed 
of the debris of countless millions of microscopic organ- 
isms — foraminifers, belonging to the globigerina kind 
Ehrenburg counted ten millions of carapaces in a single 
pound of chalk, and Alfred Maury, has made the curi- 
ous calculation that the soldier who cleans his helmet 
with a cubic inch of tripoli, handles no less than forty- 
one millions of animalculse, and at each rubbing he 
crushes about twelve millions of fossil animals. 

To-day, as in primitive times, the chalk formations 
constitute a large part of the bottom of the Atlantic 
Ocean, and also of those countries which were covered 
with sea water, through the deposit of globigerine 



^ The nummulities comprise a great variety of fossil foraminifers, 
having externally much of the appearance of a piece of money 
(hence the name), without an apparent opening, and internally a 
spiral cavity, divided by partitions into numerous chambers, com- 
municating with each other by means of small openings. 

'^ A class of Metazoic animals containing globular or cup-shaped 
echinoderms, having normally joined arms, furnished with pinnules 
and stalked and fixed during some, or all of their lives ; so-called from 
the resemblance of their rayed bodies borne upon a jointed stem, to 
a lily or tulip. 



THE HEX^MERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 89 

mud, consisting almost exclusively of carapaces, foramin- 
ifers and diatomites. The Tertiary formation in many 
parts, consists of an enormous m.ass of compact lime- 
stone, which extends from Spain to Morocco, to India 
and China; and contributes largely to the formation 
of the Pyrenees, Alps, Lebanon, Caucasus, Altai and 
Himalaya Mountains. 

The fossils which are imbedded in these terrestrial 
layers are of ah sizes, ages and shapes. Some are in 
their infancy, some in their growth and full develop- 
ment, and some in their old age. We meet fragments 
of shells, bones and skeletons of animals, and even the 
remains of their food, with the coprolites, imbedded 
with them. The coprolites or fossil excrements, are 
spread in several sedimentary layers, and may be used 
to enrich the soil, as they contain valuable properties 
for vegetable growth, they being chiefly derived from 
reptiles. 

6. THE COAL MEASURES. 

The development of vegetable life in the Carbonifer- 
ous epoch, gives us an idea of the long ages before the 
creation of man. How can we explain without the aid 
of numerous centuries the origin of coal beds? They 
are composed of heaps of humble plants, and trans- 
formed into their present state by the aid of time and 
heat. The luxuriant growth of plants in those days 
of great heat and moisture, may be sufficient for the 
formation of coal beds, but we can believe with the 
majority of geologists, that they were formed by the 
vegetation which the waters had piled up at the mouth 
of lakes, rivers and low grounds. However, it is cer- 
tain that this vegetation must have grown somewhere. 



90 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

In further proof of the necessity of long ages for 
the transformation of vegetation into coal, of great 
thickness, we will state here, that the ordinary thickness 
varies from a few inches to many feet. In a few cases 
it exceeds 40 feet, for instance, at Drombrowa, in 
Russian Poland, there is a seam 48 feet thick, which 
extends without interruption for a distance of 7000 feet. 
Thick beds of coal are often divided by intermediate 
strata into several seams, of greater or lesser thickness, 
and generally the seams are fewer and less thick than 
these intermediate layers of sandstone and slate. At 
Newcastle-on-Tyne, there are 40 coal beds; some of 
these do not show much thickness in the alternate 
layers of sandstone and slate. In Wales, we find from 
50 to 100 beds over one another, and the same can be 
seen in a few places in this country. The entire thick- 
ness of the coal beds in the* south side of Hundsriick, 
Prussia, is 338 feet. Some of the English and Ameri- 
can coal beds, may be traced continuously on the 
surface to the extent of 15-20 geographical miles in 
length, and 5-10 in breadth, while the subterranean 
extent is much greater, and may reach 50 geographical 
miles. As a rule, the American coal beds have a larger 
extent than those of Europe. 

In view of the foregoing facts, and in further proof 
of the long ages of time which intervened between 
the creation of the world and the creation of man, we 
shall for example, adduce the wonderful vegetation 
of the Carboniferous age, from which the coal beds 
of the world were formed. The great heat of the 
earth, with the sun, the humidity which naturally 
followed, and the excess of carbonic acid contained 
in the air, not yet thoroughly purified, must all be 



THE HEX/EMERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 9 1 

abandoned for a system unsupported by modern 
science. 

7. CONCLUSION. 

What could have been God's motive to imprint in the 
coal measure, Hke a seal, false ro@ts, leaves, blossoms and 
fruits of plants, which never grew? What could have 
been His motive to imbed shell fragments and countless 
generations of microscopial animals, if they never 
had existed? What could have been His object to seal 
the deep strata with bones, skeletons, and even with 
animals, surprised at the moment of eating, and with 
the remains of the food yet undigested, if they had 
not partaken food?^ The testimony of the strata as 
well as the alluvial deposits, in fact, the whole circle of 
natural science, is opposed to the literal system of the 
cosmogony. 

Following this, we meet in the fossil grounds, traces 
of rain drops with the imprints of bird claws and animal 
feet. How can we believe that the birds and animals 
which left these marks in the soft strata, had never 
trodden the plastic formations? We think enough has 
been adduced to show, that the literal system of crea- 
tion is untenable, and in direct opposition to the dis- 
coveries of modern geology and paleontology, which 
demand long ages of time for these formations and 
fossils, before the creation of man. 

II. The System of Restitution or Intervals. 

The second system founded on the interpretation 
of Genesis is. known as the system of Restitution or 



^ They have found -in the stomach of one of the fossil ichthy- 
osaurus, the scales of the fish which it had eaten. 



92 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE, 

the system of Intervals. It has few supporters among 
modern exegetists or savants, for the reason, that it 
is opposed to modern science and Sacred Scripture. It 
consists in supposing that an indefinite period had 
elapsed between the act of creation, properly speaking, 
and the Hexasmeron or six days work, described by 
Moses. During the interval in question and the six 
days, God restituted or reestabHshed the creation. 
By the first creative act, the earth was rendered fit for 
the dwelling place of organized beings, a long time 
before the six days mentioned in Genesis. It was, how- 
ever, during this interval, that plant and animal life 
had come into existence, as we find them to-day in the 
fossil state among the terrestrial layers. It was at some 
period of this interval, when the earth with all its living 
creatures and productions were destroyed by a great 
cataclysm; and one can draw inference from the allu- 
sion: ''The earth was void and empty," that is, in a 
chaotic state, that such a catastrophe really took place. 
Now, the chaotic state indicated in Genesis, can hardly 
apply to the divine work, such as went forth from the 
hands of the Creator. It presupposes a revolution 
having been brought on which destroyed all the order 
of anterior things, and must be considered as the start- 
ing point of a new creation, which interests us .more 
directly, because it should terminate by the creation 
of Adam, our first father. 

This system was first brought forward by Dr. 
Thomas Chalmers, a Scotch clergyman; defended by 
Buckland, and afterwards adopted, modified and devel- 
oped by Kurtz and Wagner of Germany. What can 
we say of this system; is it geologically and exegetically 
admissible? We shall examine its claims and see if 



THE HEXiEMERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 93 

it has any foundation that can be supported by science 
and Holy Scripture. 



I. CRITICISM OF THE SYSTEM OF RESTITUTION. 

Although the first system has little to support it 
from science or Sacred Scripture, in truth it is opposed 
to science, but this and the other systems advanced 
by geologists and exegetists, appear as if they could 
be 'maintained according to the theories put forward 
by the supporters of each system. Now, the system of 
Restitutio?! or Intervals has the especial merit to pre- 
serve to the word day its ordinary signification of 
duration of twenty-four hours. This of itself has led 
several exegetists to accept this system, though w^e can- 
not, with our present knowledge, see that it is founded 
on reason, because the Sacred Text does not indicate 
such a catastrophe, supposed by this explanation 
between the creation of the first matter and that of the 
actual world It has no scientific basis, and the result 
of paleontological inquiries shows that the actual world 
was not created in six days, but had developed itself 
slowly through long periods of time. 

The defenders of this theory support themselves 
on the hypothesis, that the creation of matter is not 
expressly mentioned in Genesis, as a part of the work 
of the six days; that certain Fathers and Doctors of the 
Church have believed in the existence of an interval 
between the origin of things and the fiat lux (Be light 
made), which, after this, opens the first day. They 
add, that their hypothesis has the advantage of render- 
ing all conflict impossible between the Bible and science. 
But when all these arguments are thoroughly sifted, 



94 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

they will not be able to bring them in harmony with 
science. 

True, several Fathers have admitted that the first 
Genesical day had begun by the apparition of light, 
thus placing the creation of matter outside the six days. 
Some even went so far as to acknowledge, though in 
general they keep silent on this point, "that matter once 
created, remained for a long time in a confused mass 
as described in Genesis. But it is far from this to 
admit that, during this period anterior to the first day, 
all the plants and animals developed themselves, whose 
remains we find in the fossil state. 

2. THIS THEORY IS AGAINST REASON. 

It is difficult for us to form an idea of a revolution 
which was sufficiently powerful to annihilate both plant 
and animal Ufe from the face of the earth, and cause 
the light to disappear completely, so that one could 
have said of our globe, "it was formless and void, or 
invisible and confused; invisibilis et incomposita, after 
the language of the Septuagint. And then, is it not 
repugnant to conceive that a God infinitely wise, who 
pursues His work by progressive development during 
countless ages, would annihilate the same afterwards 
before the appearance of the being created after His 
own image, and who was destined to become its crown 
and king? 

Let us suppose for argument sake, that some kind 
of a cataclysm had annihilated at this point, all organ- 
ized life from the surface of the earth, and reduced the 
latter to a formless and confused mass, according to 
the words of Genesis, the same laws would undoubtedly 



THE HEX^MERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 95 

govern the development of the new creation. But God 
is an unchangeable Being; the image of His divine 
attributes is manifest in all the work of creation, sealing 
by His providential plan order, unity, stability and 
harmony throughout the laws of nature. One >may 
theorize in a general way about the working of these 
laws, and draw conclusions from the results of science 
or the interpretations of Genesis to satisfy his search- 
ing and inquisitive mind, but no one has the right to 
boldly affirm without a special revelation, that God 
destroyed His own works to make room for a new 
creation, because such a hypothesis has no support 
from science, reason or Scripture. But the authors of 
this theory acknowledge with us ■ that plant life 
of the ancient world appeared gradually and developed 
slowly during long periods of time, prior to the coming 
of man. Why should not it be the same with the new 
creation? Why the long periods of development in 
the first interval, and only six days of twenty-four 
hours each in the latter creation? Most assuredly, 
it is not easy to find a satisfactory answer to this 
question 

3. THIS THEORY IS OPPOSED TO THE BIBLE. 

There is another question not much less embar- 
rassing. If the history of the globe is divided into two 
great periods, and one totally foreign to the Bible, can 
one tell at what epoch of this history the first one ended 
to give place to the second? Was it at the end of 
what they agree to call the geological ages, that is, 
the end of the Tertiary epoch? Now, to believe recent 
discoveries man must have lived in this epoch, and it 
is bold to deny that he was not contemporary with the 



96 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

mammoth and other extinct species considered charac- 
teristic of the Quaternary epoch. Hence man would 
be preadamite and prehistoric, and would have formed 
a part of the ancient world as well as of the ages of 
the animals now living to-day whose ancient remains 
are found associated with the mammoth in the deluvian 
deposits. The adherents of the theory of Restitution 
cannot reconcile these two prominent questions, and 
must flinch before this exposition. 

Again, will they maintain that the reorganization 
of the world took place at the end of the Tertiary 
epoch? Man did not exist at this early age, though 
a few have endeavored to make man very much older 
than he is. But another difficulty presents itself in 
this case; most of the Tertiary species have passed into 
the Quaternary epoch, and several of them exist to-day. 
Hence it is out of question to admit there was an uni- 
versal cataclysm which caused the total annihilation 
of previously existing beings, and there is nothing to 
authorize us to consider this date the starting point 
of a new era and complete reorganization of the globe. 

. It would be vain and short sighted in us to ascend 
yet higher in the series of the geological ages to find 
a starting point. Nowhere will one find this line of 
demarcation, which they believe exists between the 
anterior and actual world. Neither the flora nor 
fauna which characterizes each epoch disappear 
immediately with its respective epoch. Hence it is 
not apparent from the beginning that a universal 
cataclysm violent enough to entirely annihilate life 
upon earth, and cause the absolute need of reorgani- 
zation of a new order of things, complete in every man- 
ner, had ever taken place. 



THE HEX.EMERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 9/ 

This system is faulty in many respects, and the 
idea of such a cataclysm is obviously without founda- 
tion. To accept it one would be forced to reject the 
whole pregenesical theory, for this event could not have 
taken place except in very remote geological ages, 
especially since the secondary formation, for we have 
ample testimony to prove that such a catastrophe did 
not take place since the latter epoch. Now, in order 
to understand the development of life in times pos- 
terior to the reorganization of the globe, one would 
be forced to accept long periods of time, six days of 
twenty-four hours each are insufficient to represent 
one sole period of the history of the entire globe. 

We could bring forward many other proofs to show 
the falsity of the system of Restitution or Intervals, if 
we thought it necessary. Buckland and his supporters 
contend that the Bible favors it. How can that be? 
The work of all creation is described as the work of six 
days. Moses proclaims that in six days the Lord made 
heaven and earth and the sea, and all the things that 
are in them. He also adds, "These are the generations 
of the heaven and the earth, when they were created, 
in the day the Lord made the heaven and the earth." 
(Gen. ii, 4). It w^ould be difficult to find a more formal 
or conclusive text than the one just quoted. 

The adherents of this system afiirm that the world 
was organized at two different times. The first organi- 
zation took place immediately after the creation of 
matter and during the early geological ages, and the 
second took place just before the advent of man. They 
also assert that the latter organization took place 
before creation, and is supported by Moses. Now, it 
is evident by Holy Writ, that Moses answers this asser- 

D. B.— 7 



98 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

tion in a formal and emphatic manner. He tells them 
that the generations he describes as the work of six 
days, are those which took place when the heaven and 
the earth were created. It is impossible to be more 
exphcit and to the point. 

With regard to the word create, so often mentioned 
here, it is from the Hebrew word bara, which means 
^^create'' in its fullest sense, and nothing else. Further 
on, we shall explain this word more fully, and show it 
has a special significance which cannot be changed or 
modified in any manner from its original meaning. 
This word is always employed by Moses with design, 
in opposition to the word hasah ''to make," "to shape." 
It is the same word which the sacred writer employs 
in the beginning of his book when describing that 
heaven and earth have been drawn from nothing; it is 
the same word which he uses afterwards to qualify 
the appearance of animal life and of man upon the earth. 
In the latter case, however, man's creation was a 
special act of God, and not due to the sole forces of 
nature. 

It can be seen that the hypothesis of Buckland and 
his followers is not only against science and reason, but 
also Holy Scripture. It finds little favor to-day among 
savants. One of whom uses the following language: 
''The theory of Restitution supposes cataclysms, which 
in diverse epochs, and especially before the creation 
described in Genesis, would have annihilated all life 
upon earth and established a sharp line of demarcation 
between the beings previously created and those which 
have come posteriorly to inhabit the earth. Now, the 
most attentive study of the grounds and of the fossils 
which they contain, shows that these revolutions 



THE HEX/EMERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 99 

which one beUeved that could be admitted, have not 
existed; that among the flora and fauna of one geolog- 
ical period • and the flora and fauna of the period 
fohowing, there has not been any solution of continuity. 
The species of one epoch encroach on the epoch follow- 
ing and reciprocally. Among the mollusks which live 
actually in our seas, and even among the mammifers 
contemporary with man, there are several which have 
lived many centuries, and perhaps even thousands of 
years, before his advent upon earth. Therefore, we 
cannot suppose that these animals have been created 
only a few days before the creation of man."^ 

The foregoing quotation is alone sufiflcient to over- 
throw the system of Intervals. Hugh Miller supports 
the opinion and uses the same language of Lavaud de 
Lestrade,^ and adds the following: 

. . . "A¥e are led also to know that any scheme 
of reconciliation which separates between the recent 
and the extinct existences by a chaotic gulf of death 
and darkness, is a scheme which no longer meets the 
necessities of the case. Though perfectly adequate 
forty years ago, it has been greatly outgrown by the 
progress of geological discovery, and is, as I have said, 
adequate no longer; and it becomes a not unimportant 
matter to determine the special scheme that would 
bring into completest harmony the course of creation 
as now ascertained by the geologist, and that brief but 
sublime narrative of its progress which forms a meet 
introduction in Holy Writ to the history of the human 
family.''^ 



1 Lavaud de Lestrade, " Accord de la Science," pp. 30-31. 
^ "Testimony of the Rocks," p. 121. 
^ " Testimony of the Rocks," p. 122. 



OO DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 



III. The Ideal System. 

The third system founded on the interpretation of 
the six days of creation, is known as the Ideal system, 
or Ideal explanation, and also called the allegorical or 
mystic explanation. This system is substantially com- 
posed of the following questions: It admits with St. 
Augustine, that God created all things simultaneously 
by a single act of His will, and that the distinction of 
the works of creation in the Mosaic account, has no 
other end than to place the cosmogony more easily 
within the comprehension of our intelligence, by pre- 
senting the same to us in a series of six tableaux, rather 
than by one direct presentation. Therefore God did 
not make use of six days to produce the universe and 
all things therein. He drew the same from nothing 
through an act of His will. Only its exposition is 
described figuratively by six successive days, in order 
to classify the principal works and impress us with the 
magnitude of His creative acts. 

In modern times, those who have adopted the Ideal 
explanation of St. Augustine, have modified it in the 
following way: Aloses did not describe the creation 
objectively but subjectively. He does not relate what 
passed in fact interiorly or constituently in the pro- 
duction of the universe, but what took place within 
himself, as it were, when God revealed to him His works 
in a series of visions. The distinction of days is 
nothing more than the distinction of the visions. In 
order to make known to Moses His creative powers, 
God permits him to behold in six visions the works 
which had taken place in the six successive days, or the 



THE HEX^MERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. lOI 

creative acts presented in six tableaux, which the sacred 
writer describes to us in the first chapter of Genesis. 

According to the author of this theory, Mgr. 
CHfford, bishop of CHfton, Moses did not wish to give 
us a history of the creation. His sole end in describ- 
ing the works of God was to dedicate to the memory 
the days of the week consecrated by the Egyptians to 
so many special deities. For this purpose he had to 
adopt some order, but the one already mentioned does 
not answer anything real; it is not based upon facts, 
therefore we are not enjoined to accept it. 

I. CRITICISM OF THE IDEAL SYSTEM. 

Now, regarding this system, there is much about 
it that seems to please its supporters, because it cuts 
short all the difficulties of reconciliation which have 
arisen between the Mosaic account and the results of 
science. Moses does not describe in wdiat manner the 
universe organized and developed itself. He only 
traces an imaginary picture, consequently, there is no 
longer contradictions nor reproachments possible be- 
tween his poetic description and the rigid demonstra- 
tions of geologists. 

The basis of the system, which Mgr. Clifford and 
his followers have adopted, as already shown, is in the 
existence of the week consecrated by the Egyptians 
to their special gods. There is no real foundation for 
this thesis, inasmuch as the origin of the pagan and 
Egyptian week cannot be maintained the present day. 
T. H. Martin,^ a member of the French Institute, 
tells us: ''It had been already successfully combated in 
the midst of the seventeenth centurv, in the Memoirs 



^ Annales de Philosophic Christienne, Jan. 1882. 



102 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

of the Ancient Academy of Inscriptions and Belles 
Lettres/ by the learned Abbe Sallier, who at that 
time had given it a blow from which it could not raise 
itself since; and in the nineteenth century, the finish- 
ing blow was given to this erroneous thesis by a dis- 
tinguished member of the new Academy of Inscrip- 
tions, Alfred Maury, together with an illustrious and 
very Christian astronomer, Jean Baptist Biot. 
Among the nations of antiquity, one cannot prove that 
there has been ever a single one that did not employ 
the week as a chronological period, abstracting from 
all religious intention, without having received it from 
the Hebrews, or better, from the Jews, who were the 
propagators thereof." 

The bishop of Clifton made a great mistake when 
he referred to Herodotus and Dion Cassius to help him 
on this point, for the former tells us of the Egyptian 
months, but not a word about a period of seven days 
composing the week, and this silence is quite signifi- 
cant. Dion Cassius expressl}^ states that the period 
of seven days in use in Rome and elsewhere, '' is origi- 
nally from Judea." 

Besides the authors just quoted, we learn from 
Champollion, what was the exact division of time 
among the ancient Egyptians. In the whole, it was 
the Republican Calendar of the French Revolution; 
division of the year into twelve months, divided into 
three decades of ten days, and followed by five comple- 
mentary days. The week of seven days does not appear 
therein. 

Hence, Moses could not borrow the idea from the 

1 Vol. IV. 



THE HEX.EMERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. IO3 

Egyptians, nor is it probable that he borrowed it from 
other sources, not even from the Chaldeans. There- 
fore, we cannot attribute to him the intention of putting 
the polytheistic week in place of the monotheistic, and 
substituting to the pagan deities, who presided over 
the days, the works of creation arbitrarily divided. 

For argument sake, let us suppose such was the 
object of Moses, the proposed system receives no 
benefit from this, because there is first a difficulty which 
immediately presents itself to the mind. The sacred 
writer does not content himself in describing the differ- 
ent works of God, but tells us in plain language that 
one took place on the first day, the other on the second 
day, and so on to the seventh day, when God finished 
the work of creation (Gen. ii, 2). It seems to us 
there is here every evidence of succession of days. We 
find this statement corroborated in Exodus (xx, 11): 
" In six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and all 
things that are in them and rested on the seventh 
day." 

All this is of no importance to the author of the new 
theory. He tells us that both texts are borrowed from 
a historical work. The first is extracted from a sacred 
hymn, such is, in his eyes, the nature of the first chap- 
ter of Genesis. The second is a liturgical formula, 
the terms of which must not be taken in their ordinary 
sense, hence there is no reason to attach any impor- 
tance to them. 

This is a very easy and off-handed way of solving 
such a grave question; for, texts so clear as those which 
precede do not lose their meaning, even were they 
found in a ritual or liturgical book. The thought of 
the sacred writer seems to be evident, and we do not 



104 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

believe that until now there has been two manners of 
seeing in this regard. 

Moreover, it is not proved that the first chapter of 
Genesis has the character of a hymn, or sacred chant. 
In the first place, it is in prose, an observation which 
has already sealed its importance. Then, it is un- 
questionable, that the book to which it belongs is 
absolutely historical. To refute this quality of the first 
chapter, Mgr. Clifford appeals to the difference of 
style, especially in the employment of the word Elohim 
to designate God, instead of Jehovah which appears 
later. This distinction of rationalistic origin tends, 
it is true, to establish that Moses would have inserted 
in his work ancient documents to which he preserved 
their primitive form, but it does not follow from this 
that these documents are void of all historical character. 

2. CHALDEAN COSMOGONY. 

In support of his thesis, the learned prelate appeals 
to the recent discoveries of Assyriology. Now, it 
happens that these discoveries completely upset his 
hypothesis. We already owe to Berosus a Chaldean 
cosmogony, which presents the appearance of things 
in an order analogous to that indicated in Genesis, but 
with an idea of a yet more marked chronological succes- 
sion. A cuneiform inscription, unfortunately incom- 
plete, has been discovered and preserved for public use, 
which substantiates this idea.^ It is a detailed account 
of the primitive state and progressive development of 
the universe. '^A great number of days and a long 
time elapsed," it says in the middle of the account. It 



See George Smith's Chaldean account of Genesis, pp. 62-63. 



THE HEXyEMERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. IO5 

gives US clearly to understand that there was a succes- 
sion in the formation of the globe. It does more, 
it expressly tells us that the days of Genesis were not 
days of twenty-four hours but periods of unHmited 
duration. 

The Chaldean inscription has another advantage. 
To the description of the work of six days, it joins the 
account of the fall of man. From this it results, that 
these two accounts, which some would like to see 
separated, and one not confirming the other, are inti- 
mately connected, and serve to prove the. texts in 
Genesis relating to the works of creation and the fall 
of man. Therefore, when the one is historical the other 
must likewise be the same. 

We must not assimilate or confound the two cos- 
mogonies, that is, the Biblical and Chaldean, for the 
reason, that the latter is disfigured by myths, which- 
takes away much of its value at first sight, of what it 
has preserved of its primitive features. Nevertheless, 
it must be taken into serious consideration by the 
exegetist, for everything proves that it is, if not 
in its actual form, at least, in its essential account 
anterior to Moses, perhaps even to Abraham. That 
it has preserved to us in its alteration, an ancient tra- 
dition, which the sacred author, on the contrary, has 
transmitted to us in all its primitive purity. Mgr. 
Clift'ord is astonished because God has revealed to Moses 
geological facts, which are within the domain of natural 
sciences. This revelation would explain itself suf- 
ficiently by the importance of the fact in question; but 
nothing obliges us to believe it was made only to Moses. 
It is quite probable that it is much anterior to him and 
that God communicated this revelation to Adam himself. 



I06 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Thus we can trace the source from which they drew the 
records of these Chaldean documents which seem 
anterior to the Hebrew legislator. 

Whatever way we may regard the case, it appears 
that the first chapter of Genesis traces for us the real 
history of our globe before the coming of man. Were 
this page, as one pretends, a hymn placed by Moses at 
the head of his book, we ought yet expect a truth there- 
in. Its adoption by the inspired writer would give 
to it the same character of veracity as to other 
BibHcal accounts, and we must always hold as certain 
that the things have succeeded in the order so exactly 
indicated by the same. 

We may admit that the number of six days into 
which Moses has divided the works of creation, is, in a 
certain sense, an arbitrary number. Perhaps, it was only 
adopted because the number seven was already a sacred 
one among the Hebrews (Gen. iv, 15-24; vii, 2-34). 
Moses could with the same facility divide this work 
between ten periods, for there is nothin'g to prove that a 
precise line of demarcation separates the diverse days. 
But we cannot refuse to admit, because Moses declares 
this in a formal manner, that the order which he pre- 
sents to us is really the chronological order, the one in 
which appeared in their turn, at the will of the Creator, 
both the inanimate and animate beings which as a whole 
constitute the universe. If it were different, we would 
have to say that the sacred writer has expressed himself 
in a manner to lead into inevitable error all the future 
generations. This is inadmissible, and we cannot think 
for a moment that the Holy Ghost who inspired him 
permitted him to commit a false statement which would 
produce such grave consequences. 



THE HEX/EMERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. IO7 
3. ACCORD BETWEEN GEOLOGY AND SACRED SCRIPTURE. 

It is Strange that the truth of the BibHcal cosmog- 
ony would be contested at a time the geologists, who 
are free from party prejudice and not blind to reason, 
willingly render it homage. Nowhere, perhaps, is this 
accord more striking betw^een the accounts of science 
and those of the Sacred Books, than on geological 
ground. Here we find such an astonishing coincidence 
that it cannot be the effect of chance. Geology has 
never tried hard to remain orthodox, and never proposed 
to come to the assistance of the defenders of Biblical 
truth, nevertheless, it has divided the history of the 
globe into three great periods anterior to the advent 
of man; characterized the one by its wonderful vegeta- 
tion, the other by the prominence of aquatic animals, 
and the third by the number of land animals. This 
is precisely the order we find in Genesis, and which 
represents the third, fifth and sixth days of creation. 
We do not need to speak of the other days, for they 
are consecrated to recall to our minds the creation of 
light, the firmament, and finally, the celestial bodies. 
It is not the business of geology to make inquiries 
about this order of things, but it is certain, that in all 
researches where its control has been possible, it has 
turned to the glory of our Sacred Books whose indica- 
tions it has confirmed. 

Mgr. CHfford asks: ''Who would risk to affirm that 
the study of Genesis has ever led to the discovery of 
one single geological fact?" We can readily answer 
his question and say, that the succession into three 
distinct periods and of three great series of beings 
which compose the organic kingdom, that is, the 



I08 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

vegetable, aquatic and terrestrial, is a geological fact of 
the first order, and this was known to Genesis before 
the study of the terrestrial layers had been made a scien- 
tific truth. The relatively recent appearance of man 
upon earth, is a fact of the same order, which the 
Sacred Books made known to us before it was pro- 
claimed by geology. 

And what difficulties arise before the views of the 
bishop of Clifton, when he beholds the acceptation of 
the generally received theory of the period-days? 

"The Biblical account" he says, ''seems in disaccord 
not only with the discoveries of modern science, but 
also with the wisdom of Egypt, in which Moses had 
been educated. The Egyptians knew very well that 
the vegetation depends, for its development, upon the 
action of the sun. . . . When the date of the 
creation of this astre must be taken in a historical sense, 
and as implying that the earth existed, that it turned 
upon its axis, that it was covered with vegetation before 
the sun, the centre of the system of which the earth 
forms a part, came to its existence, it is useless to make 
the attempt to reconcile such a proposition with the 
unquestionable facts of science."^ 

Now we behold Moses caught in the fact of error, 
if, with the great majority of interpreters, we set him 
up as a historian! 

4. OBJECTIONS REFUTED. 

We believe that the error is on the side of the new 
exegetist, who gives here proof of a singularly incom- 
plete science. Moses, we must remember, does not 

Annales Phil. Christ.~Nov. 1881. 



THE HEX^MERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. lOQ 

tell US that the sun was created on the fourth day, but 
only that it appeared on that day. Hence, we may 
believe it had previously existed as the centre of the 
planetary system, perhaps even as a luminous body. 
All we are obliged to admit, and this is not against the 
geological accounts, is, that in this epoch, supposing 
reasonable inhabitants of the globe had really existed at 
the time, did perceive for the first time the disk of 
the sun, the immense cloud, which before surrounded 
the earth, having finally torn itself to give passage to 
the solar rays. It would be easy to prove by analogy, 
in showing what passes in certain equatorial regions, 
that these conditions were precisely those which 
combined to the development of the immense vegeta- 
tion of the anterior period — the Carboniferous period. 
What is needed for the tropical forests, in order 
to grow luxuriantly, is great heat, to be sure, but 
a diffusive heat and light more than the direct action 
of the solar rays. 

When we can believe that the sun existed, but 
masked by thick clouds before the fourth day of crea- 
tion, then nothing hinders us to admit that then it 
only became luminous. The theory of Laplace, which 
is now generally received, proposes to our belief, that 
each of the bodies of our planetary system did in its 
turn play the role of the sun, favors this hypothesis, 
for the central astre, precisely because it is immensely 
greater than the others, and must have entered into 
this phase of its existence a long time after. By 
this hypothesis, one would not be embarrassed to 
find the primitive source of light, which sprang forward 
since the beginning at the word of the Creator, and 
which, enUghtened the earth during long periods of 



no DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

time, in the way of its formation. Without seeking 
any further, we may beheve the moon was that incan- 
descent body which first gave hght to our globe, and 
thus contributed to entertain Hfe upon its surface. 

Mgr. CHfford vaguely opposes other difficulties to 
the system of periods. He assumes, for instance, that 
the progress of geology has condemned them; that this 
science in substituting the theory of the actual causes 
for that of cataclysms, does not permit any longer the 
division into periods having, as Genesis tells, a morning 
and an evening, a beginning and an end. 

The theory of causes, readily 'accepted by some, is 
far from having brought forward its proofs. It always 
had among the best geologists decisive adversaries, and, 
if there is something in it, nothing at least authorizes 
us to completely eliminate the violent cataclysms of 
our globe's history. Were it true, it would not at all 
shake the theory of the day-periods. Nothing obliges 
us to believe that each of the Genesical days has been 
limited by a violent phenomenon; the passage, even 
insensibly, from one work to the other, is suf^cient to 
mark the end of one period and the beginning of an- 
other. When the sacred writer appears to insist on 
the precision of this separation; when, repeatedly, he 
employs, to mark it better, the expressions evening 
and morning, it is undoubtedly that the expressions 
evening and morning convey to us the idea, that he 
wishes us to behold in the seven periods of the creation 
the figure of the seven days of the week. 

Mgr. Clifford speaks of new difficulties which the 
progress of geology would create to the theory we 
defend. Perhaps he has in view what Genesis says 
about the creation of plants before that of animals. 



THE HEX.EMERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. Ill 

Now, geology shows us certain fishes already living 
in the Silurian, which is anterior to the Carboniferous 
epoch, the latter showed the greatest development 
which vegetation ever reached, because it is to this 
we owe our immense coal deposits. Moreover it 
shows us below the Cambrian ground, consequently 
quite to the origin of life, an animal of a very inferior 
order — the Eozoon Canadense, which the Evolution- 
ist has just put into bold relief for the needs of his 
theory when hard pressed; but every scientist knows 
that the existence of this pretended zoophite is very 
questionable. In every case, it is of no importance 
to our question; for Moses, who evidently does not 
assume to be a naturalist, mentions only the superior 
animals — those which could attract the attention of 
man. 

Finally, if even some of these animals were found 
imbedded in the transition grounds belonging to the 
primary epoch ; if even the secondary layers would reveal 
to us the debris of so'me representatives of the terres- 
trial mammifers and reptiles, which appear in masses only 
later on, it would be true to say that the primary period 
has been characterized by the extraordinary develop- 
ment of the vegetable kingdom, the secondary period 
by its aquatic animals of variable forms, and the ter- 
tiary period by the abundance of terrestrial animals, 
exclusive of man who, according to science and the 
Bible, was the last in. the order of created beings which 
appeared. 

5. EVIDENCE OF A PRIMITIVE REVELATION. 

There is, here we repeat, such a remarkable concord- 
ance that it is, according to our views, both the effect 



112 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

and proof of a primitive revelation. It was impossible to 
take the things in their whole and without entering into 
details which circumstances did not permit, to describe 
in a more exact manner the work of creation. And 
we ask those who see errors, irregularities, or even 
" absurdities " therein, how they would proceed to give 
us in so few words a cosmogony which would be more 
in accord with science, and which would offer us more 
titles to our acceptation. 

In summary, the reasons which Mgr. Clift'ord brings 
forward against the almost unanimous opinion, that 
sees in the first chapter of Genesis the historical account 
of the creation of the world, will not stand a serious 
examination. It is, therefore, wise to preserve the 
weapons used up to the present to defend the Sacred 
Books. Those they offer us in exchange appear too 
weak and futile; others may say, perhaps with good 
reason, that they are dangerous. 

IV. The Concordistic System. 

The fourth system of the interpretation of the first 
chapter of Genesis, is known as the theory of day- 
periods, because it considers each of the six days to 
represent an epoch or period of unlimited time, and not 
an ordinary day of twenty-four hours. It is also called 
Concordistic, because it affirms to be in concord be- 
tween Genesis and the sciences, and therefore in opposi- 
tion to other theories in which tliey deny this accord 
l^etween the Mosaic account and the researches of 
geology. The adherents of the day-periods understand 
by the Genesical days long periods, during which the 
world organized itself progressively and conformably 



THE HEX^MERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. II3 

to the physical laws; by gradual development and per- 
fection it was rendered a fitting abode for all organized 
life, and when sufficiently prepared, God produced 
by His immediate action, the plants and animals. These 
reproduced and developed themselves, bringing forth 
and dying with the march of time, in obedience to the 
laws of their nature. Man was the last to appear; he was 
the crowning work of the Creator, being created in a 
special manner by the hand of Him who fashioned 
everything according to His will, and who breathed 
into him a soul immortal. The theory of day-periods 
was adopted by Cuvier in 182 1. 

I. CRITICISM OF THE CONCORDISTIC SYSTEM. 

We adopt the theory of day-periods, which continues 
to regard the first chapter of Genesis as historical, but 
understanding it in the following manner, and by being 
careful to not exaggerate the Concordistic relations 
between the Biblical cosmogony and geology. 

There has been a development, an ascending scale 
of progression in the divine work from the beginning. 
The Creator, at first, produced the elements of matter, 
as we are told in the first verse; these have, through 
their diverse combinations, formed the inorganic and 
mineral matter; after which appeared successively the 
plants, the lower and higher order of animals, and 
finally man. 

Genesis does not assume to be a scientific treatise 
by any means. It only gives the principal features of 
the cosmogony, and does not enter into details. Conse- 
quently, all the attempts which have been made to make 
particular points of geology agree with the sacred 

accounts, are merely conjectural. The natural sciences 
D. B.— 8 



114 ' DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

have established the fact of the production of inorganic 
and organic beings, in the same ascending gradation 
as mentioned in Genesis. This of itself is sufficient 
to afhrm an accord between them. The following 
clear, succinct and logical examination of this accord, 
by the distinguished savant, M. Barrande, who covers 
the whole ground, and leaves no doubt in the unbiased 
mind that there exists an irreconcilable conflict between 
the accounts of Genesis and the researches of geology: — 

''With regard to the creation of the organized 
beings, the whole account of Genesis reduces itself to 
establish three great facts, about which it is in perfect 
harmony with the scientific accounts acquired thus far 
by the geological science. These facts can be formu- 
lated as follows: i. The vegetable life has preceded 
the animal hfe in both the seas and upon the earth. 
2. The animal Hfe has been at first represented by 
the animals living in the sea and by the birds. 3. Con- 
sequently, the animal life has been developed pos- 
teriorly upon earth, and man has appeared only after 
all the created beings. 

1. . . . We know that the marine vegetables, 
known under the name Fucoids, have preceded the 
apparition of the ancient fauna. . . . It is the 
schists placed above the fucoid grit, and conse- 
quently posterior to this, that we meet the first traces 
of animals constituting the primordial fauna, chiefly 
represented by the Crustacea of the family of the tribo- 
lites. With regard to the terrestrial plants, there exists 
no trace in the rocks of the Silurian system, except 
perhaps in England, in the so-called tilestone layers, 
which border upon its upper Hmit. . . . After the facts 
we come to indicate, the most ancient earthly plants 



THE HEX.EMERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. II5 

ascend to the epoch where the Silurian ground ends 
in depositing itself. Now the only vertebrate animals 
known in the epoch consisted in some species of fishes, 
yet very rare. They have discovered no trace of any 
earthly animals ascending to this period. The most 
ancient of all the animals which have breathed the air 
and the traces of which have been known until this day, 
has been found in the upper part of the old red sand- 
stone or Devonian ground of Scotland, that is, above 
the horizon which is assigned to the Devonian plants 
of which we come to speak. It is a small reptile whose 
length did not attain ten centimeters. It is known 
under the name Telerpetofi elginense. The facts con- 
sidered until at this moment agree therefore to show 
that the vegetation has preceded the apparition of the 
animals, as well upon earth as in the sea. As to this 
point, Genesis is therefore in perfect accord with the 
discoveries of science. 

" We must also consider that the gradation estab- 
lished by Moses in the creation of the vegetable king- 
dom agrees well with the facts observed by science, which 
acknowledges that the plants offering the most ele- 
vated organization have appeared much later than the 
inferior types of the vegetable kingdom. Moses, after 
having enumerated the three principal degrees in 
the vegetable organization, did not occupy himself 
to fix exactly the epoch in which each of them has 
made its apparition, either through the effect of a 
slow transformation of types primitively created, and 
in virtue of a law of development which was imposed 
upon them, or by a direct and repeated action of the 
Creator. In other words, Moses only seems to have 
wished to establish the relative order of the epochs in 



Il6 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

which God was pleased to create the prototypes of the 
classes of beings which had already succeeded one 
another, and which succeed themselves yet in the series 
of times. He made abstraction of the history of the 
development of these beings, the chief successive forms 
he enumerates however. 

■''II. The animal life has been at first represented by 
the animals which live in the sea and by the birds. As 
to the sea animals, the fact of their existence before that 
of the earthly animals goes forth incontestably from all 
geological observations made until this day. . . . 
The primordial fauna on the globe explored, composes 
itself almost solely of articulate animals of the class 
of the crustacese, constituting the family of the tribo- 
lites. The mollusks are hardly represented therein 
except by some lower types of the class of the brachio- 
pod^.^ The second fauna enriches itself chiefly by 
the apparition of a great number of types of mollusks, 
representing nearly all classes of this branch. The 
third fauna shows the yet more considerable develop- 
ment of the mollusks, and distinguishes itself from the 
two preceding faunas by the apparition of some rare 
fishes, which are the first representatives of the branch 
of the vertebrates on the globe. In the Devonian 
faunas, the fishes take in their turn a great and a rapid 
development, in harmony with that of the mollusks. 
. After these considerations . . . it is evi- 
dent that the animal life in the seas has been anterior 
to the animal Hfe upon earth. 

''As to the birds, one conceives naturally that cer- 



^ The brachiopodse, a class of the mollusk-like animals, distin- 
guished by the development of two labial appendages diverging from 
either side of the mouth. 



THE HEX.EMERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. I I / 

tain kinds must have existed in the most ancient 
epochs, because they Hve of fishes, of moUusks and other 
sea animals. However, the most ancient traces which 
we know to-day do not ascend beyond the Triassic 
epoch. 

"After having exactly fixed the point of origin as 
to the marine animals and the birds, Moses enumerates 
in a remarkable manner the principal types of the ani- 
mals which have peopled the seas, starting with those 
which are crawling, that is mollusks, until the fishes 
and the large cetacese. The order followed in this 
enumeration corresponds perfectly with that which 
we observe in the series of geological formations. But 
after these general indications, although sufficient in 
a book which is no scientific treatise, Moses does not 
occupy himself to determine the precise epoch when 
each of the animal classes has made its particular ap- 
pearance in the seas. . . 

''III. Since it is proved that the animal life has been 
at first represented by the animals living in the sea 
and by the birds, it follows necessarily that the animals 
which inhabit the surface of the earth ascend to a less 
ancient origin. Btit we must well remark that after 
having fixed the relative epoch of their appearance, 
Moses has not sought to instruct us about the diverse 
epochs when types of the animal life upon earth have 
made their particular apparition. It appears certain 
however, that they have not been created all at once, 
but successively, like the sea animals of which we come 
to speak. Each of the ancient types has disappeared 
after a more or less long existence, to make room for 
new types, 

''Thus, in summary, the sacred historian appears 



Il8 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

to have proposed to himself principally for end to fix 
the relative epoch of the apparition of the plants, of the 
marine animals and of the terrestrial animals, without 
entering into historic detail with regard to the subse- 
quent development neither of the vegetable reign nor 
of the anirnal reign. This development took place in 
the series of time, either through a new and repeated 
action of the Creator himself, or through the effect of 
the laws originally established by Him in nature and 
which He has not judged proper to reveal to us. 

''In studying from this point of view the history 
of the creation of the vegetable kingdom and of the 
animal kingdom given by Moses, one recognizes 
that it is in perfect harmony with that geology has 
drawn from the observation of the facts, that is, from 
the strateographic study of the sedimentary rocks 
and of the organic remains, either vegetable, or animal, 
which they contain.''^ 

Astronomy also shows the necessity of long periods 
to the Genesical days. The telescope makes us behold 
stars so distant that, if we are to believe astronomers, 
they need over 10,000 years to transmit their light to 
us, which travels over 225,000 miles per second. They 
even speak of 1,000,000 years for certain nebulae lost 
in the depths of space. If the world had existed only 
6,000 or 8,000 years, as it was formerly believed, all 
these astres would still be invisible to us. 

We may ask why the Genesical days should be days 
of twenty-four hours? A day is usually measured accord- 
ing to the rising and setting of the sun. The sun, as 
we know, appeared only on the fourth day. One can 
see the difificulty which comes in the way of this 

^ Geological note of M. Barrande. 



THE hex.e:meron or teie six genetic days. 119 

hypothesis, though declared by its adherents the most 
natural and the one most acceptable. 

Will they tell us that the first three days are meas- 
ured by the duration of the rotation of the earth upon 
its own axis? Surely, they would be days without 
nights, and the words evening and morning, to which 
they attach a proper and literal meaning, must be taken 
in the figurative sense, as well as in the theory of the 
day-periods. 

Let lis add that these days would have more than 
twenty-four hours. The duration of the rotation of a 
celestial body upon its own axis, diminishes indeed with 
its volume. Now, according to the theory almost uni- 
versally accepted, a theory which everything confirms, 
even the text of Genesis {terra erat invisibilis et incom- 
posita), our globe was primitively in the gaseous state. 

There was an epoch when its surface extended itself 
to the actual lunar orbit and even beyond it, for the 
moon, in the system of Laplace, is only a fragment of 
the terrestrial nebula detached from its periphery and 
condensed afterwards. Li this epoch the earth re- 
quired the time to turn round upon its own axis that 
our satelHte employs now to accomplish its revolution 
round our globe, a little more than twenty-seven days. 
The Genesical days, even agreeably to the hypothesis 
we combat, were therefore very different to the actual 
days. This is the negation itself of the hypothesis that 
the creation took place within the space of six days, of 
twenty-four hours each. 

Another grave question is presented in Scripture. 
The sacred writer tells us that God rested on the 
seventh day. According to the common opinion of 
theologians, this seventh comprises the whole time 



120 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

which followed the apparition of man and always con- 
tinues. Hence, it is not a period of twenty-four hours, 
and everything goes to show that the other days are of 
the same nature. 

2. THE COSMOGONIC TRADITION OF DIVERSE NATIONS. 

The cosmogonic traditions of the diverse nations 
of antiquity confirm this interpretation. The Chal- 
deans, Phenicians, Persians, Etruscans, etc., have 
believed in the division of the creation into six periods 
of long duration. May these traditions be derived 
from a Hebrew source, or may they be connected, like 
the Biblical cosmogony, with one and the same primi- 
tive revelation. Plowever, they are no less significant. 

'Hn all the pagan cosmogonies" says Pozzie, *^the 
world has been at its origin a chaos; it was inclosed in 
an egg which broke and whose half has formed the 
heavenly vault, the other the earth. Whence this idea 
which we find among all the nations? This is not a sim- 
ple idea, which rises spontaneously in the human brain, 
because among the philosophers, the one suppose the 
universe to be eternal, whilst others make it rise from 
the fortuitous meeting of atoms hooked in the space. 
Besides, the chaos has no analogy in the actual nature. 
We behold no being going forth from a confused and 
informal mass. And then, how can we reconcile the 
chaos, the ideal of the disorder and of death, with the 
egg, which is the most beautiful symbol of fife and har- 
mony? Hence, because we find this idea among all the 
nations, it must have come to them from a common 
source, it must form part of those primordial beliefs 
which constituted the religion of primitive humanity 
and which the nations, during the dispersion, carried 



THE HEX.EMERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 121 

along with them. It is thus that we can explain the 
numerous resemblances of these cosmogonies. It is thus 
that we can explain equally those not less striking which 
they present with Genesis, with that difference, how- 
ever, that the cosmogony of the Hebrews is much more 
correct and better united, and that which gives us the 
key to all the others. By the latter the two contradic- 
tory notions of the tgg and of the chaos complete them- 
selves. The earth was void and empty and darkness 
was upon the face of the deep: Behold the chaos. And 
the spirit of God moved (brooded) over the waters 
(Hke a bird); behold the idea of the egg of the world, 
idea which we find from one end of the world to the 
other until at the natives of the Sandwich Islands, ' In 
the time when all was sea,' they say, ' an immense 
bird was hovering over the waters and laid an egg from 
which went forth the Island of Haoua'i.' But, these 
reserves made, everything goes to show that the 
Hebrews, hke the other nations, had drawn the account 
of the creation, which is at the head of Genesis, in the 
primitive tradition of humanity, from which all the 
pagan cosmogonies went forth." ^ 

3. THE CONCORDISTIC SYSTEM ESTABLISHES THE MOST 
COMPLETE ACCORD. 

From all the facts we have adduced here and in the 
preceding section, the results fully show that the Con- 
cordistic system alone establishes the most complete 
accord between Genesis and science. Let us observe, 
however, that it goes forth from w^hat has been said 
on all points intimately connected with the six days 

^ Pozzie, "La terre et le recit Biblique de la Creation," 1874, 
pp. 244, 245. 



122 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

of creation, that the Mosaic days are metaphorical, 
not only as to their meaning, but also as to their 
number. The figure six in Genesis must not be taken 
in a rigorous and absolute sense; it does not signify 
that one counts only six epochs in the series of the 
productions of the Creator; we must understand in the 
sense that there have been several successive periods 
of development. This number was chosen only in order 
that the divine week might correspond with the human 
week, in which six days are given to labor, and the 
seventh, the Sabbath, is consecrated to rest. More- 
over, we may remark that the Mosaic cosmogonv points 
out only the chief features in the work of creation. The 
details which are of less importance in the eyes of man- 
kind in general are neglected. 

Hence we may say there are three kinds of omis- 
sions: I. The little striking objects (mollusks, marine 
plants) are omitted or included in the general affirma- 
tion of marine life; 2. The meagre beginning as to the 
number or importance of the objects of a work, which 
had its full development in one of the following days. 
Thus, on account of this secondary importance regard- 
ing the large aquatic reptiles, the fishes, properly 
speaking, are passed over in the third and fourth days 
when they were al)Ounding, and named only in the 
general recapitulation, which refers to the fifth day- 
epoch of the great creation of marine life; 3. Also the 
continuation or repetition of a work already mentioned 
under one day, is passed over in silence; for instance, 
the continuation of the emersion of the continents, 
the substitution of one species to another in the same 
general category of living beings; thus, although the 
creation of the actual species did not take place before 



THE HEX.^MERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 1 23 

the sixth day, one could however place the creation 
of plants in the third, and that of the marine animals in 
the fifth. 

As to the creation of the plants on the third day, 
which fact gives rise to a particular objection, the smi 
having been created only on the fourth, we shall answer 
this objection when we come to examine more fully 
the Hexsemeron. 

The Mosaic account therefore contains no detail 
which is irreconcilable with the sure accounts of science, 
and, in summary, the Concordistic theory or day-period, 
seems the most acceptable. It is, however, like the other 
theories on which we have commented, only a system; a 
fact which we must keep in mind. It was especially 
the desire of Moses to impress on us the belief of a God 
Creator, and show Him gradually preparing the earth 
to serve as a dwelling place for man, and His great, 
solicitude for his well being. 

How long did this preparation last? This is a 
secondary question whose solution has no theological 
importance. When one admits that the Genesical days 
are periods of undetermined length, it is evident that 
wx cannot fix after the Bible the origin of the universe, 
because we ignore how many years — how many centu- 
ries — these periods have lasted. But were one to main- 
tain that the six days were only ordinary days of 
twenty-four hours, we would still not know in what 
epoch the universe was created. In fact, the Sacred 
Text teaches us that only the element? of which 
heaven and earth are composed, have been pro- 
duced by the divine power. ''In the beginning of 
time;"' it does not explain to us what interval sepa- 
rates us from this initial point; it does tell us how 



124 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

many years or centuries the chaotic state prolonged 
itseh", the state in which all was confounded before 
the work of the first day. The duration of this primi- 
tive period is, therefore, totally unknown to us. Science 
may calculate and speculate at will its probable length 
of time, but it can never be scientifically estabhshed 
beyond doubt. The American geologist, Professor 
Dana, has calculated on the respective thickness of the 
sedimentary stages, that the Primitive era must have 
lasted about 36,000,000 of years, the Secondary era 
9,000,000, and the Tertiary era 3,000,000,^ in all 48,000- 
000 of years. Our Sacred Books do neither approve nor 
contradict these calculations, for on this subject they 
are absolutely silent. " I have discovered neither 
in Scripture, nor in reason, nor in the monuments 
of other historians, any chronological character 
which might help us in the inquiry of the time of the 
creation,'' wrote Des Vignoles in 1738, and he re- 
nounced all attempts at ever discovering its date. 
Indeed, it belongs to the savants, and not to the exe- 
getists nor the historians to make this inquiry. And 
we can say to the paleontologists and the geologists, 
attribute to the universe as many centuries as you 
judge proper, you will have to give an account of your 
calculations or of your hypothesis only to science — 
theology is disinterested in this question. 

^ Dana, Manual of Geology, New York, 1876, p. 591. 



CHAPTER VII. 



THE HEXyEMERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DATS. 

[ Continued. ^ 

I. 

MUCH importance is attached to the first two 
verses of the Bible, as they are the groundwork 
and superstructure of the world's history from the be- 
ginning, and stand to-day as they have in the past, 
impregnable to all attacks, misrepresentations and false 
theories. "In the beginning God created heaven and 
earth, and the earth was void and empty, and darkness 
was upon the face of the deep, and the Spirit of God 
moved over the waters." 

1. "IN THE BEGINNING GOD CREATED HEAVEN AND 
EARTH." 

There exists in no language any sentence which con- 
tains in so few words so many important dogmas. 
The Mosaic cosmogony is the condemnation of all the 
errors of the ancient world. The sacred writer does 
not speak in an abstract or philosophical manner, but 
in concrete terms. As a historian, he announces the 
fact, without delivering himself to any commentary, 
and the first verse alone of his book is sufficient to make 
all the errors of ancient and modern times detestable 
and insignificant. '' In the beginning God created 

(125) 



126 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

heaven and earth." Consequently there exists only 
one God, contrary to the general beHef of- all nations 
at that time with the exception of the Hebrews; the 
former adored several gods and had a "divinity in every 
bush." This sentence also summarily disposes of the 
subject of matter. Matter is not eternal, because it 
did not exist before God created it. God has drawn 
matter from nothing by an act of His all-powerful will. 
He is the absolute master of the world as the world, and 
all things contained therein were created by Him. With 
all this evidence before him, man has been prone to 
error from the earliest times. Peoples and philoso- 
phers have believed that matter was not distinct from 
God himself; they were called Pantheists; others again 
believed that matter had always existed — they were 
known as Hylozoites — the same as our modern Materi- 
alists. Moses overthrows all these erroneous systems 
with one sentence: ''In the beginning God created 
heaven and earth." 

2. CRITICISM OF THE FIRST VERSE OF GENESIS. 

The first verse of Genesis has been understood in 
three different ways: i. As a summary of the whole 
chapter and the work of the six days; 2. As indicat- 
ing a complete creation, quite distinct from the 
following, from which it should have been separated 
by a gcvological revolution marked in the second verse; 
3. As signifying the creation of the first matter or 
elements of matter. This last sentence is the only one 
admissible, because the second verse is inexplicable in 
the first two cases, as we have shown in another place. 
Moses could not say at first that the earth was void 
and empty, if there had been no creation of the first 



THE HEX.^MERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 12/ 

matter, before the organization of this matter. There 
is seemingly, a sequel between the first and second 
verse, but only under the condition of admitting that 
God primitively created all the elements — heaven and 
earth, which in Hebrew designate the universality of 
the beings. Most of the Fathers too, have understood 
it in this sense. 

Let us inquire further: What does Genesis mean 
by the word bard, which our Vulgate translates here 
as elsewhere, creare — *' to create." The true meaning 
of the verb bard, employed by the original text here, 
is to produce ex nihilo — ''of nothing." The equiva- 
lent of the word ex nihilo is not found in the Hebrew 
Pentateuch, because the language of Moses has no 
corresponding expression, but the sense which the 
Bible attaches to the verb bdrd is beyond question. 
However, some contemporary infidels deny this as the 
following will show: 

''Modern exegesis rejects the interpretation of the 
creation ex nihilo, which they often give to the Hebrew 
verb bdrd. This verb signifies essentially to cut, to pare, 
to shape, in the sense to cut the trees of a forest, etc. 
Far from excluding the idea of a preexisting matter, 
it implies the same. Also passages like Gen. i, 2y, 
and ii, 7, for instance, prove that the notion of a crea- 
tion ex nihilo has no foundation in the Hebrew text."^ 

Nothing is more at variance with the spirit and 
meaning of the texts just quoted than these assertions. 
In the first two chapters of Genesis, we find four differ- 
ent verbs to express the creative action of God: i. bdrd 
— to create; 2. dsdh — to make; 3. yodsdr — to form; 



^ Saurj, "Theories Naturalistes du Monde," pp. 48, 49. 



128 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

4. bdndh — to build. Bard is used for the creation of the 
universe as in Gen. i, i ; the great fishes of the sea, in 
verse 21, and of man, in verse 27; elsewhere, God makes 
His creation from the substance already created, as in 
verse 17, 16, 25; or He forms the beasts of the field from 
the earth, ii, 9; or, finally, He builds the woman, ii, 22.^ 
Not only here but in almost all the passages of 
Scripture, where we meet the word bard, it expresses 
the creation ex nihilo. This word is reserved to God, 
particularly associated with His creative work, and He 
is always the subject thereof, to mark the creation of 
heaven and earth. Moreover, God produces the 
creature by His sole will. The mode of creation in 
Genesis, is the word, that is, an act of the will: 

He spoke and they were made ; 

He commanded, and they were formed. 

— Ps. CXLVITI, 5. 

The words following '' heaven and earth," expressed 
two ideas, and mean the universe, the same which the 
Greek books of the Old and New Testament call the 
Kosmos. According to St. Augustine, we would have 
to understand here only that primordial mass out of 
which was formed ''heaven and earth." This primitive 
mass would be meant by the words ''earth and water." 
This explanation has not only the clear expression of 
the text against the ideas of many other interpreters, 
that "heaven and earth "mean here two different things, 
but is more conformable to the meaning of other 
passages. No doubt, this difference of explanation 
comes from verse 2; the " earth " about which there is 

^ Cf . Is. xliii 7. In this sole verse, Isaias employs the first three 
words. 



THE HEX^MERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 1 29 

question, in opposition to ''heaven and earth," as in 
verse i, cannot possibly signify the primitive heaven and 
primitive earth at the same time. It is just what the 
name tells without any exegesis — the earth itself; under 
the expression " heaven," we have to understand the 
material heaven, not the heaven which is the abode of 
angels, as was formerly accepted. Against the latter 
interpretation other passages are decisive, because, 
several texts speak of the destruction of heaven and 
earth at the end of time. '' In the beginning, O Lord, 
thou foundest the earth, and the heavens are the work 
of Thy hands. They (heaven and earth) shall perish, 
but Thou remainest."^ We cannot find a passage in 
Scripture wherein heaven and earth is mentioned that 
means both the spiritual and material creation, and it 
is less allowable here, because in the following verses, 
heaven does not mean the spiritual (9-10) and the earth 
the material world (2-10). If the angels are meant to 
be included in the first verse as the creatures of God, it 
is reasonable to infer it is only in so far as they belong 
to the world, but it does not mean that they are espe- 
cially denoted by the word '' heaven." 

3. ORGANIZATION OF THE ELEMENTS OF MATTER. 

After having affirmed in the first verse the creation 
of the elements of matter, Moses makes known to us 
the organization of the same. God puts in order the 
elements which had remained in a state of confusion 
until then, thohu vabohu (void and empty) as the 
sacred writer tells us. Thohu vabohu does not express 
chaotic shapelessness, as w^e learn from the following 

1 Ps. CI. 26-27; Cf. Math. xxiv. 35; Peter iii, 7, 10, 12, 13: 
Acts xxi ; Is. Ixv. 17; Ixvi. 22. 
D. B.— 9 



I30 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

texts: " He did not create (the earth) in vain (or 
desolate)" says Isaias xlv, i8, "but formed it to be inhab- 
ited," and Jeremiah says: " I beheld the earth, and lo it 
was void and nothing; and the heavens, and there was 
no light in them. I looked upon the mountains; and 
behold they trembled; and all the hills were troubled. 
I beheld, and lo there was no man; and all the birds of 
the air were gone. I looked and behold Carmel was 
a wilderness, and all its cities were destroyed at the 
presence of the Lord, and at the presence of the wrath 
of his indignation. For thus saith the Lord, all 
the land shall be desolate."^ Thus, what were the 
heavens without the Hght, what were the mountains 
and hills without firm foundations, what was the uni- 
verse without man and birds, what was the land of 
Carmel without its cities and fruitfulness: That was 
the earth in the state of tkoku vabohu. Indeed, 
it is yet earth, but deprived of its proper ornament, it 
is "void and empty." All this stands as the effect of 
a divine desolating judgment. " All the land shall 
be desolate." From this, it is to be understood that 
also thohu vabohu cannot be rendered to indicate 
" formless, shapeless, bottomless," for the ** invisibilis et 
incomposita (invisible and confused)" of the Septuagint, 
must be translated according to the Hebrew text, with 
" invisible and unadorned," which is about the same as 
" void and empty." One cannot appeal here to the text 
of Wisdom xi, i8: "Thy Almighty hand which made the 
world of matter without form," because the primordial 
formlessness need not to be understood as an absolute 
one, but only as a relative one, consisting in the want 



1 Jer. iv. 23-27. 



THE HEX^MERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 13I 

of form and beauty essential to the world for its 
development and full completion. When we designate 
a person ill shaped, we do not mean by this that he or 
she is shapeless or devoid of form. The thehom, which 
St. Jerome translated with abysus — ''abyss," follow- 
ing the Septuagint — does not point to a chaos. It is 
nothing else but the tihamtu of the Assyrians, the same 
the Chaldean account of Genesis makes use of in this 
place, and which designate the ''sea," meaning the same 
as the ' 'waters. " In this, it agrees with Laplace's 
theory, which assumes that the earth was at first a vast 
globe of vapor, then a liquid spheriod. 

4. AND THE SPIRIT OF GOD MOVED OVER THE WATERS. 

During the interval which separated the creation 
of the first matter from the apparition of the light, the 
Spirit of God (considered by some Fathers, the Third 
Person of the Blessed Trinity, and by others, the wind 
which agitated the waters, as rendered by the Hebrew 
rouakh, signifying both spirit and wind), worked at 
the elaboration of the universe. It is this that Moses 
expresses by saying: "And the Spirit of God moved 
over the waters," or as the Hebrew text' more cor- 
rectly translates it, and as translated by some of the 
Fathers: " The Spirit of God brooded over the Avaters." 
Chaos is therefore under the influence of the Divine 
Spirit; it is intended that life shall come forth from 
it as from the ^gg on which the bird is brooding. The 
chaotic mass as it is, is unworthy of God, as it has not 
been produced to remain inert, but that it may supply 
the raw material for more perfect forms; and by the 
words: ''The Spirit of God moved (or brooded) over 



132 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

the waters," Moses declares that the chaos contams the 
germs of these more perfect forms, or that the divine 
purpose and the divine power are ruhng over this 
inorganic matter, in order to form it into varied, beau- 
tiful and perfect organic types. 

The interpretation of this passage as given by both 
ancient and modern rationalistic and believing writers, 
is this: ''And a wind of God hovered or passed over 
the waters." " This translation is exegetically inadmis- 
sible," says Reusch. No doubt the first meaning of 
Rouakh is '' breath," and so of course a '' wind," and the 
expressions ''mountains of God," "cedars of God," may 
be quoted as parallels to that of " wind of God," would 
mean a mighty storm. But these expressions are strict- 
ly poetical, and Rouakh Elohim never has this meaning 
in the Old Testament, although it very often has that 
of " Spirit of God." And besides this, the word 
rachaph, whether it is translated hovered or brooded, 
does not apply to a storm. 

After clearing up and explaining the objections and 
false interpretations of the first two verses of Genesis, 
we shall proceed to examine in the next section, the 
account of the six day's work, in order to show how it 
accords with the results of the natural sciences. 



II. 

Having examined the first two verses of the Bible, 
the various systems of their interpretation touching 
the Mosaic cosmogony, we shall now enter more into 
detail concerning certain results of natural science, in so 
far as they are in accord with Genesis. For this purpose 



THE HEX.^MERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 1 33 

we shall examine each day's work in the order given, 
and trust we shall be able to prove, so far as the actual 
state of knowledge will permit, that it essentially 
corresponds with the scientific history of our globe. 

I. FIRST day's work. 

Gen. i, 3-5. (3) ^''And God said: Be light made, and the light 
"joas made; (4) And saw that the light %uas good; And He divided 
the light from the darkness; (5) And He called the light Day and 
the darkness Night, and there -was an evening and morning one 
day.-" 

The first day we can call the cosmic period. This 
period embraces the cosmogony in general or the crea- 
tion of the elements of matter. It comprises the long 
space of time indicated in the first five verses of Genesis, 
and corresponds both to the time which preceded the 
first Mosaic day as well as to the first day itself; science 
knows nothing of this period except by induction. 

Certain savants have made all kinds of objections 
against the creation of light on the first day, in the 
name of science. " How can we understand that the 
light did exist before the sun," they say. To this 
Phaff repHes: "When we seek in the works of the 
physicists the answer to this objection, What is light? 
then either do we not find it therein or we meet therein 
the following avowal: We do not know what light is; 
we can only study its properties, and these make us 
consider it as very probable that it is a kind of an 
infinitely subtle fluid, spread in the space like ether, 
and put into movement by bodies what we call lumin- 
ous. They are the undulatory movements of this 
ether which produce in us the sensation of light. How 
does all this take place? We do not know. The true 



134 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

nature, the essence of the Hght, is totally unknown to 
us. 

'' When we consider in what circumstances the ter- 
restrial bodies develop the light, we discover that it 
is generally in the following manner: i. A great eleva- 
tion of temperature renders luminous the bodies which 
are not this; the incandescent metals; the incombustible 
objects between the poles of an electric battery emit a 
lively light, without that we can notice any other 
change in their properties. 2. The intense and rapid 
chemical combination of two bodies in the combustion, 
for instance, is equally accompanied of a disengagement 
of light. 3. The disengagement of electricity produces 
also a blending light, like the flashes of lightning prove. 
Such are the best known and more ordinary phenomena 
which associate themselves to the manifestation of light 
upon earth, but in no case can we tell what the essence 
of light is. All we know are the facts which pass thus, 
without being in the state to explain why. 

''As to the different celestial bodies which appear 
to us lum.inous by themselves, in studying them by the 
means of the spectroscope, we see that we must con- 
sider them as incandescent gases or as bodies in fusion. 
When we observe now that the nebula and the comets 
disengage themselves from the light, we must conclude 
from this that the gaseous masses, even in the state 
of the greatest rarefaction, can already be luminous. 
In w^hat epoch in the formation of the universe the 
emission of light began, the natural sciences cannot 
tell, but they can affirm that the light could have mani- 
fested itself long before the separation of matter and 
the formation of the particular bodies. Consequently, 
there cannot be question of a contradiction between 



THE HEX^MERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 1 35 

the accounts of Genesis and those of natural sciences, 
relatively to the origin of light. "^ In other words, 
the first part of the Mosaic account is unassailable 
from a scientihc point of view. 

The third verse says, that it became light only in 
consequence of an act of the divine will, that is, one 
quality of chaos — darkness, was removed. Darkness, 
however, was not quite removed, but it is no longer 
absolute; having lost its sole supremacy, it is kept within 
certain limits, and its relation to light is fixed.. God 
divided the light from the darkness. This relation is 
that of a regular change; and this alteration between 
light and darkness is called day and night, so that when 
Moses says God called the light day, and the darkness 
night, he means that the alteration between light and 
darkness, called day and night, rests upon a divine 
ordinance. This alteration began at once; God creates 
light, and so it is day. After a time, the length of 
which is not mentioned, darkness sets in again, and it 
is night; this in turn gives place to light, the second 
appearance of which is the beginning of the second day. 
'' And the evening and the morning were the first day." 

However, we have shown in another place that the 
word yom — " day," must be taken in a figurative sense. 
Certainly, it does not designate before the fourth day, 
the ordinary succession of day and night, because the sun 
did not yet shine in the horizon, therefore, it is reason- 
able to accept it in a metaphorical sense, and the same 
will apply to the first part of the account. Although 
the word day has a literal meaning in our language, and 
does not necessarily express an indefinite period, never- 



* Phaff, " Schophungsgeschichte," pp. 745-746. 



136 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

theless we employ it often in an analogous manner. 
Modern languages, though giving the word day its 
ordinary sense, are still very rich in expressions denot- 
ing long time, such as duration, epoch, age and period, 
but in Hebrew it is different, there is only the word 
yom — " day " to indicate an indefinite duration, the 
same as we understand by the word epoch or period. 
Hence, the Hebrew word yom may signify, and does 
signify in a geat number of Scriptural passages, an 
indefinite period. 

The foregoing reasons fairly establish the possibility 
of the sense of epoch given to yom. There are other 
considerations to prove that Moses does not employ 
it in this chapter to signify a solar day of twenty-four 
hours, but to mean an indefinite time. He tells us that 
the sun, which serves now to regulate the day, did not 
appear before the fourth yom; consequently, the 
first three yomiin were not solar days, and analogy 
authorizes us to understand the following three days 
in the same sense as the three preceding ones. 

The cosmogonic traditions of other nations con- 
sider the days of creation long periods. According to 
Hindoo tradition, Brahma remained 360 days in the cos- 
mic Q,^^g, of which he formed the heaven and the earth. 
Each of these days were 12,000,000 years. ^ In the Per- 
sian tradition, the creation was divided into six stages, 
which form six equal epochs, in an order similar to that 
of Genesis. Each of these epochs was 1,000 years. We 
find in the old Etruscan tradition, the Supreme God had 
employed 12,000 years at the production of His works; 
1,000 at the organization of heaven and earth; 5,000 



* Cf. W. Jones, " Institutes of Hindoo Law," 1794, pp. 9-10, 



THE HEX.EMERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 1 3/ 

years at the engendering of animated and inanimated 
beings, and i,ooo years at the formation and duration of 
man/ The Phenician cosmogony appears to have 
admitted a Hke interval of time between the different 
\Yorks of creation. This appears after a passage of 
Philo of Byblos, abbreviator of Sanchoniaton; the chaos 
and the surrounding air were at first extended to the 
infinite, and had found limits only after a long series 
of centuries. The Chaldean cosmogony referred to in 
a previous chapter, probably admits also that the days 
of creation were long periods. 

2. OBJECTION. 

To establish that the days of creation are ordinary 
days of twenty-four hours each, they explain the origin 
of the v/eek, and that the rest of God on the seventh 
day is the reason for the institution of the Sabbath. 
Ex. XX, lo-ii. 

Although the creation of the world explains the 
origin of the week, we must not conclude from this, 
that the word yom must be taken in the literal, and not 
in the figurative sense. On this point, Father Palmieri, 
very sensibly remarks: ''There is good reason why 
those seven spaces of time or epochs were called days, 
rather than by any other name, namely: the series of 
those epochs will exist as a type of the week, which 
is a kind of a measure of our time; the seventh future 
day was the type of that day, when one must rest 
and praise God." Therefore, the work of creation was 
divided into six days, followed by rest on the seventh 
day, in order to impress more profoundly on the mind 



1 Suidas, Lexicon. 



138 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

of the primitive people, the obUgation of sanctifying 
the Sabbath. Hence, the natural employment of the 
words day, evening and morning, as being the most 
proper to represent the division of the great Sabbatic 
week. 

3. THE MEANING OF THE WORDS EVENING AND MORNING. 

Having examined the meaning of the word yom or 
" day," we shall now inquire into that of ereb and boger 
— evening and morning. Moses has metaphorically 
used the word day to designate each of the revolutions 
of the world and the creative acts, and continued the 
metaphor by calling the total space of time which 
elapsed between one revolution and another, evening 
and morning. He placed the evening before the morn- 
ing according to the usages of the Hebrews, who 
reckoned journeys, etc., from evenmg, with us from 
midnight, a custom of which we have yet traces in the 
Offices of the Church. As to proof that the Hebrews 
sometimes employed the words evening and morning 
figuratively we have only to read Daniel viii, 26-14: 
'' The vision of the evening and the morning. 
Unto evening and morning, two thousand three hun- 
dred days. . . ." 

A fact worthy of remark, and which seems to indi- 
cate that the words evening and morning are only 
figurative terms, is the creation, properly speaking, 
that is, the production from the bosom of nothing of the 
elements of matter, which had not been preceded by a 
cosmic revolution, is related without any otiier desig- 
nation of time but " In the beginning." It is only after 
the first organization of the elements, that there is 
question of evening and morning. 



THE HEX^MERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 1 39 

4. OBJECTION. 

The chief objection, and a very weak one too, 
against the foregoing explanations is, that it is new and 
in opposition to tradition. But it is easy to answer 
that there is no unanimous and constant tradition as 
to the manner we have to understand the cosmogony 
of Genesis. Since Moses did not speak scientific 
language with precision and rigor, his account is 
susceptible of many interpretations, a fact borne out 
in every epoch, as it was diversely explained by the 
Fathers and theologians. Doubtless, none among the 
ancients understood the word day exactly in the sense 
of epoch or indefinite time, because in their days they 
lacked the geological knowledge which could have 
enlightened them on this point, and helped to discover 
its true meaning. But a great number among them, 
particularly the whole exegetic school of Alexandria, 
with St. Augustine, beheld only figurative expressions 
in the words day, evening and morning. In this respect 
we come to the same conclusion, and attach to these 
words only the signification required by demonstrated 
scientific discoveries, as surely as the Fathers would 
have done had they lived in our times, because in their 
days they have had recourse to science to explain the 
Mosaic creation. 

5. SECOND day's work. 

Gen. i, 6-8. (6) ^^ And God said: Let there he a firmament 
made amidst the -waters; atid let it divide the -waters from the 
waters; (7) And God made the firmament, and divided the waters 
that -were under the firmament from those that ivere above the firma- 
ment, and it was so; (8). And God called the firmament heaveti, and 
the evening and morning were the second day^ 



I40 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

The terrestrial nebula which remained gaseous dur- 
ing the length of- the first day, continued to condense 
itself during the second day, and soon passed into the 
liquid state. Then a crust formed itself on the surface 
of this mass, and the waters, that maintained till then 
a vaporous state through natural heat, became partly 
condensed and gave rise to the seas. This is the separa- 
tion of the waters of which mention is made in the 
sixth verse. The atmosphere meanwhile remained 
charged with thick clouds, which up to the fourth day 
hindered the light of the sun and other bodies from 
being seen. 

The separation of the upper waters from the lower 
waters, or in other words, the atmospheric vapor from 
the terrestrial waters, has been considered as the forma- 
tion of the firmament, but this term, quite scientific, is 
not found in the original text; hence, it is wrong to 
reproach the sacred writer for making use of inaccurate 
terms, and putting forth false ideas concerning matter 
of cosmography. Nothing obliges us to believe that 
Moses had a knowledge of the terms such as we possess 
to-day, but at the same time we must acknowledge that 
the expressions which he had used are not at all contra- 
dictory to actual science. What he relates as the work 
of the second day, is the formation of the atmosphere, 
and this did not really exist while it contained in a 
vaporous state the totality of the earthly waters. 

Some commentators wished to behold in the waters, 
of which there is question, at the entering of the second 
day, the gaseous matter of the primitive nebula, and the 
separation of the upper waters from the lower, the 
breaking of this nebula into solar and terrestrial 
nebula. But this comment is too distorted and far 



THE HEX^MERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 14I 

fetched from the Hteral meaning of the words as intend- 
ed by Moses. Tlie sacred writer always spoke the 
ordinary terms of the language so as to be clearly under- 
stood by the people; scientific expressions at that 
epoch were unknown to all, as they are of modern 
origin, and " coined " from time to time to meet the 
exigencies of modern progress in science.- However, 
in making the second day accord with a more advanced 
phase of our globe's history, we have still the advantage 
of preserving to the word waters its Hteral meaning. 
This signification is much more probable, as the precipi- 
tation of a part of the atmospheric waters must have 
naturally preceded very closely the third day, charac- 
terized by the development of vegetation. Plants 
could not live without water to moisten their roots, 
nor without a certain light to maintain the chlorophyl 
or green of their leaves. 

Besides this, if the foregoing interpretation were 
established, there would be a serious break in the Bible. 
The time, though undoubtedly vefy long, which elapsed 
between the first formation of the earthly crust and the 
appearance of life upon its surface, would not be repre- 
sented in Genesis, whilst according to our explanation 
it corresponds with the second day. 

The period of the formation of the universe is called 
by geologists the Primary or Azoic Age, because it 
offers no trace of life. It was during this period that 
the amorphous, crystalline and metaphorical rocks, 
gneiss and the primitive granites, first rudiments of the 
continents, showed themselves, yet quite bare in several 
places in Europe and America. The thickness of the 
grounds of this epoch, which can be recognized by the 
absence of all traces of animal and vegetable life, is, 



142 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

according to Zittel, about 45,000 feet. This period 
is also called Geogenic, to distinguish it from the first 
day, which is called the cosmic period. 

6. THIRD day's work. 

(re«. I, 9-13. From hypotheses -we pass to the doitiain of facts, 
and find accord with Holy Scriptures no less striking. (9) '■'•God 
also said : Let the vj'aters that are under the heaven be gathered to- 
gether into one place; and let the dry land appear, and it ivas so done. 
(10) And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together 
of the ivaters, he called seas, and God saw that it was good. (11) 
And he said: Let the earth bring forth the green herb, and such as 
may seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after its kind, which may 
have seed in itselj upon the earth, and it was so done. (12) And the 
earth brought forth the green herb, and such as yielded seed according 
to its kind and the tree that beareth fruit, having seed each one accord- 
ing to its kind, and God saw that it was good. (13) And the even- 
ing and the morning were the third day.'''' 

The third and fourth days correspond to what 
geologists call the Paleozoic or Transition Age, thus 
named, because we find in it the most ancient traces of 
life, debris of submarine flora and fauna, crypt ogamise, 
algae, Crustacea, mollusks, tribolites, echinites and corals. 

At the beginning of this age, the solid crust was 
recovered by precipitated waters. The first islands 
emerged in consequence of contraction of the terrestrial 
envelope. The atmosphere, coarsely purified, permitted 
only a diffuse light to reach the earth, but this light, 
though feeble, was sufficient for the first development 
of the terrestrial vegetation. No other age has left 
such traces of luxuriant vegetation. It was then that 
the carboniferous and coal flora arose, not in multi- 
plicity of kinds or brightness of colors, for it was rank 
and coarse, but its grandeur consisted in colossal 
dimensions. The coral flora contained about 800 



THE HEX/EMERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 1 43 

species, while the actual flora is composed of 80,000 
to 100,000 species of plants. The former was far more 
luxuriant than the vegetation of our tropics, and most 
of the extinct species surpass their like of to-day.^ 
Shave grasses, which may be seen in our marshes, at- 
tained the marvelous thickness of a man's body, and 
reached from sixty to seventy feet in height. Mosses 
and ferns too attained such size over that of correspond- 
ing species now known, that comparison would be 
out of question. But no flower with brilliant colors, 
no fruit tree with blossoms, relieved the gigantic growth 
of vegetation, for the coal flora bore no other ornament 
than its green color. 

"Another striking character of this flora," says 
Zittel,^ " was the rapidity of its growth. Our ferns 
were annual plants, and the stem of the calamites 
(species of reeds which have with them so much 
affinity) must have attained, probably in a few months, 
a thickness from one to thirty feet in diameter. Such 
a vegetation is possible only in a damp and tropical 
climate. Those competent to judge estimate that the 
temperature was at that time seventy-five centigrade 
degrees^'^(on the Spitzburg, where one finds the coal)." 

^ With regard to the creation of vegetation, we must observe 
that Moses refers the creation of all the species to the same geologi- 
cal day; but he seems, as we shall show further on, to have expressed 
himself only in the way of anticipation, in order that he would not 
be obliged to re-enumerate or return to the same subject, because 
science shows that the most elevated types of the vegetable king- 
dom appeared only later on. 

^ Zittel, "Aus der Urzeit," p. 253. 

^ The centigrade thermometer introduced by Celsius, and uni- 
versally used by physicists, divides the interval between the freezing 
and boiling points of water into loo*^, the zero of the centigrade 
thermometer being placed at the freezing point ; 5° centigrade are 



144 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

To-day we can hardly form any idea of the develop- 
ment of this vegetation without variety, and without 
inhabitants. What gives the greatest charm to our 
forests is the song of birds, hum of insects, and the 
movement and voice of mammifers, but all these were 
wanting. Its vegetation in some respects resembled 
that of New Zealand, where yet dominates the primitive 
flora; the tree-like ferns and the majestic araucarse 
(species of large evergreen trees with verticillate spread- 
ing branches, covered with stiff, narrow, pointed leaves, 
and bearing large cones, each scale having a single 
large seed). " No bird balanced itself yet in the 
branches of the trees," says Hochstetter, '' no mammi- 
fers animated the depth of the forests. All was desert 
and silent.^ Hardly a few isolated scarabaei and scor- 
pions were erring in the moss.*'^ 

During the coal period there was not yet, as Moses 
tells us, any mammifers nor any birds. There were 
already, but in limited number, some low amphibia, 
fishes, and a few low animals in the marshes and shallow 
waters, where they were covered by thick vegetation. 

The flora of the carboniferous grounds displayed 
itself during long centuries.^ We can imagine during 

equal to 9° Fahrenheit, and the point marked 10° on the centigrade 
scale corresponds to the point marked 50° on the Fahrenheit scale. 

^ F. von Hochstetter, " Geological Tables of the Primitive 
World," p. 16. 

"^ It is in place to remark that a certain number of geologists 
have attributed to the coal period a very exaggerated length of time. 
Grand Eury has done justice to these exaggerated statements by show- 
ing that the carboniferous layers were made with vegetable and floated 
bark, and not with vegetables that grew on the place. Hence the nec- 
essary time for the formation of these layers is infinitely less than one 
supposed, when it is remembered that there has not yet been any dis- 
placement in the plants transformed into coal, and that they had grown 
successively on the spots themselves. Annales des Mines, Paris, 1882. 



THE HEX^MERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 1 45 

this long period a series of warm and damp days. Let 
us present to om'selves a greenhouse intensely heated, 
its glass covering and sides blackened in a manner so as 
to partly intercept the solar rays, and its chief light 
that of an electric flame burning inside. What would 
be the result of vegetation under such conditions? 
Colossal plants without lively colors — giants with 
greenish heads; and such was the coal vegetation. 

The character of the coal vegetation furnishes an 
answer to one of the objections brought against the 
Mosaic account, and really confirms the latter. How 
could the plants develop themselves without the action 
of the solar rays? they ask. To this Pfaff replies with 
fairness and conciseness: " It is not that the plants 
stand in need of the sun, but only of the light and heat. 
Now both Hght and heat existed unquestionably before 
the sun; this is a certain fact in natural history." 

Moreover, recent experiments have directly and 
completely solved the difficulty. It has been proved 
that electric light possesses all the necessary qualities 
for the development of the green parts of the plant. 
Mr. FamiiTzin, in all his experiments with the algae, 
always made use of a very strong light from a coal oil 
lamp, to obtain the development of these vegetables. 

The coal flora being characterized by the absence 
of bright colors, what must we conclude from this, but 
that the sun did not yet act upon our globe. It is an 
established fact, that the plants which have formed 
the coal beds, belong to species which need shade and 
humidity, and the same can be said of the class of living 
creatures which appeared about that time. 

Following these, some batrachians began to appear; 
also the archegosaurus, dendrerpeton, lepterpeton, pro- 
D. B.— 10 



146 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

triton, petrolei, similar to our actual salamander. We 
also find traces of the labyrinthodon, a breathing ver- 
tebrate, and seventy-four species of fishes. " But the 
amphibia at that time," says Zittel, " were small, and 
their form could hardly be noticed; they were, however, 
the most elevated beings of the paleolithic creation." 
Moreover, they are rare, specially when we consider 
the great spreading of life which followed. Hence, 
Moses could not enumerate the number of lower species, 
and, therefore, passed them over in silence. He men- 
tions only the class of beings which characterized 
each epoch. 

7. FOURTH day's WORK. 

Gen. i, 14-19. (14) '■'■And God said: Let there he light made in 
the firmament of heaven^ to divide the day and the night., and let 
them he for signs, and for seasons, a?id for days and years; (15) To 
shine in the firjnament of heaven and to give light upon the earth, 
and IV as so done. (16) And God made two great lights, a greater 
light to rule the day, and a lesser light to rule the night, a?id the 
stars. (17) And he set them in the firma^nent of heaven to shine 
ufon the earth; (18) And. to rule the day and the night, and to 
divide the light and the darkness, and God saw it was good. (19) 
And the evening and the 77iorning were the fourth day.'''' 

The work of the fourth day escapes the control of 
geology, because there is question not of the earth but of 
the celestial bodies. There is, however, every reason 
to belive that it coincides with the end of what is called 
the Primary or Transition Age, that is, with the forma- 
tion of the Permian ground. Indeed, as we shall show 
further on, the lower or carboniferous stage represents 
the third day, and the Secondary Epoch, doubtless 
represents the fifth day; hence, we have to place in this 
interval the apparition of the stars. 



THE HEX.^MERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 1 47 

We say apparition and not creation, because Holy 
Scripture does not say that the astres were created on 
the fourth day. They were in their own proper spheres, 
revohdng silently and unobserved for a long time, 
but their light was hidden by thick clouds, and. only 
became visible after the clouds had been rent asunder 
for the first time. 

Undoubtedly, we could believe, without placing 
ourselves against the cosmogonic theory as generally 
accepted, that the sun commenced at this epoch to 
emit both heat and Hght, but then we might ask our- 
selves, from whence the source of heat which caused the 
rapid growth of vegetation of the preceding epoch? It 
could not have emanated from the moon, for that orb 
is much smaller than the earth, and must have been 
covered with a crust ere this; neither is it probable 
that the earth furnished its own internal heat, though 
its crust, yet so thin, and the poor conductibility of the 
rocks, which constituted the same, had, during that 
time, hindered the internal fires from exercising such a 
sensible action upon its surface. The simple fact that 
the sun, moon, and the stars date from the same day, 
proves there is question only of their apparition, for it 
would be contrary to science to say that all these astres 
were created or had become luminous at the same 
epoch. 

The hypothesis of a thick cloud until the fourth 
day, that is, until the beginning of the Secondary 
Epoch, completely concealing the astres from view, is 
entirely conformable to science. In the first place, it 
is natural to suppose that the atmosphere was not 
thoroughly purified at the beginning; the elevated tem- 
perature that reigned upon the surface of the glo1:)e, and 



148 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

attested by the living beings and plants of this primitive 
epoch, must have maintained in a vaporous state, many 
bodies, either liquid or solid to-day. The carbon actual- 
ly stored up for the future needs of utility and industry 
in our coal mines, was undoubtedly, at that time, 
scattered in the atmosphere in the form of carbonic 
acid, which composition was largely absorbed by the 
luxuriant plants of the coal period, and helped greatly 
to clear the sky. 

Moreover, as already mentioned, if there is one fact 
demonstrated in vegetable biology, it is, that the 
inferior plants, analogous to those which produced the 
coal, attained nowhere such luxuriant development 
than in this warm, damp and murky atmosphere. The 
ani-mals of this epoch attest the absence of the direct 
action of the sun. The reticulated eyes of the tribolites 
prove at once the existence and poverty of the Ught. 
IVl. Heer has estabUshed that most of the insects, hke 
the blattidse and termites of the coal epoch, were " noc- 
turnals." 

Hence, ever3'^thing concurs to establish that the 
thick clouds hindered the direct action of the solar rays 
to make themselves felt on the surface of the earth, 
until the coal vegetation helped to purify the atmos- 
phere of carbonic acid. Like the Bible, science teaches 
us that the appearance of the sun and the astres had to 
follow, and not precede, the extraordinary develop- 
ment of vegetation, which inaugurated the geological 
times. Here again, one cannot imagine a more strik- 
ing accord, and this accord can hardly be the eftect of 
chance. It was impossible for Moses to make such a 
true record without revelation, a fact formerly con- 
sidered improbable, but which so clearly goes forth from 



THE HEX.EMERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 1 49 

the scientific accounts recently established, that it can 
no longer be doubted by the rational savant. 

8. FIFTH day's work. 

Gen. i. 20-23. (20) '■'■God also said: Let the waters bring forth 
the creeping creatures having life, and the fowl that may fly over 
the earth under the firmament of heaven. (21) And God created the 
great whales, and every livitig and moving creature which the waters 
brought forth according to their kinds, and every witiged fowl ac- 
cording to its kijid, and God saw that it was good; (22) And he 
blessed them, saying: Increase and multiply and fill the waters of the 
sea; and let the birds be multiplied upon the earth. (23) And the 
evening and morning were the fifth day. 

The fifth day coincides with the Secondary or Meso- 
zoic Epoch of geologists. By describing it under the 
preceding features, it really seems that Moses had a 
view of all animated nature, and of all the landscapes of 
this epoch. 

That which characterized the fifth day, were, he tells 
us, the mxarine monsters, the aquatic reptiles and the 
winged creatures. Now, when we cast a glance at one 
of the tableaux in which geologists have tried to recon- 
stitute some scenes of the secondary times, we are 
amazed at the sight of these marine monsters, those 
enormous aquatic reptiles which give to the fauna of this 
epoch a special physiognomy. Among the aquatic or 
amphibious animals we point to the Ichthyosaurus and 
Plesiosaurus, two gigantic saurians. The former was a 
fish-like reptile, thirty feet long, having somewhat the 
shape of a cetacean mammal, with an enormous head, 
whose jaws were garnished with one hundred and eighty 
teeth, devouring turtles, mollusks, and even those of 
similar kinds. Its neck was short, a tapering body, with 
four paddle-like flippers, and probably a fin-like expan- 



150 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

sion of the caudal region. The latter was a lizard whose 
length was more than thirty-six feet, had a serpent-like 
head with a jaw six feet long, its swan-like neck was 
from fifteen to eighteen feet long, and had from twenty 
to forty cervical vertebra, whilst the giraffe has only 
seven. Both the fore and hind Hmbs constituted 
flippers or paddles, like those of the cetacean mammals, 
having numerous phalanges inclosed in a common in- 
tegument like a fin. Others, like the Teleosaurus, 
something similar to our actual crocodiles, but which 
surpassed them, in dimensions; the Mosasaurus, called 
also, .animal of M^estricht, an immense lizard, which 
also had aquatic habits; finally the Megalosaurus and 
the Iguanodon, othr lizards of dreadful aspect, which 
attained colossal proportions. The Megalosaurus, 
whose gigantic body measured about sixty feet in 
length. " Whose teeth," says Mr. Figuier, " seemed 
to be at once a knife, sword and saw." The epoch to 
which Moses refers the creation of the reptiles, is so 
characterized by this class of living creatures, that some 
geologists have called it, " the era of reptiles." 

As to the flying creatures, we can hardly imagine 
anything more remarkable than the Pterodactylus, and 
its relative the Ramphorhynchus. Both were a kind 
of flying dragon or lizard, provided with a length- 
ened muzzle in the form of a bill, with teeth 
similar to those of the crocodile, sharp claws like 
those of the tiger, and wings like those of the bat. The 
imprints of real gigantic birds are not wanting in the 
secondary grounds. They complete the series of 
succession of dominant types as recorded by Moses, 
and authorize us to identify the Secondary Epoch with 
the fifth day's creation. 



THE HEX.^MERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 15I 

The first appearance of birds corresponds to the 
epoch of the great saurians, conformably to what 
Moses tells us. The IVIesozoic Age comprises three 
stages of grounds: the Triassie, Jurassic and Cretaceous. 
The Jurassic and Cretaceous grounds presents imprints 
of large, long-legged birds of the genus ostrich. But 
Luitil now, which confirms the account of Genesis, they 
have not met in these grounds any mammifers, except 
a very small number of insectivorous rodents, and later 
on in the chalk deposits, a kind of oppossum didelphis. 
Mammifers appeared only in a posterior epoch; it was 
towards this end of the Tertiary Age that their reign 
had actually begun; they are the work of the sixth day.' 

9. OBJECTION. 

Some translators do not understand the work of 
the fifth day as indicated by the foregoing explanation. 
The Vulgate, for instance, translates the passage: " Let 
the waters bring forth the creeping creatures, and the 
fowl that may fly over the earth." They have con- 
cluded from these terms, that there is here a question 
of fishes and birds, properly speaking. Now, the orig- 
inal text has not quite this sense. If Moses had wished 
to speak of fishes, he could have done so in the clearest 
manner, for the Hebrew has a word which conveys a 
precise meaning. In making use of the word cheretSy 
which in a general sense signifies reptile, and especially 
when the word is accompanied with the qualifying* 
clause, " having respiration of life," it seems that the 
sacred writer wished to include the fishes, which do 
not creep, and which, deprived of lungs do not breathe, 
properly speaking. It is also saying too much with 
regard to the birds. The proper meaning conveys the 



152 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

idea, '' to be flying," which also appHes with equal 
force to these strange creatures with wings, Uke the 
pterodactylus, which animated the terrestrial landscape 
of the Secondary Epoch. 

When one wishes to make the Bible say that the 
waters brought forth the aquatic animals, it is from all 
points of view an error, for the Hebrew word cherets 
which they translate in this manner, has not this mean- 
ing, for it signifies '' creeping," and can also be trans- 
lated in the present case " to abound." 

Some commentators, preoccupied wrongfully with 
geological discoveries, have believed that here there 
was not a question of aquatic animals but of reptiles, 
properly speaking. Undoubtedly the Hebrew word 
cherets has two meanings, but the context shows clearly 
that there is question of animals that live in the water. 
Indeed, we read immediately after: 

'' And God created the great whales (cetos magnos- 
belluas marinas, according to Gesenius), and every living 
and moving creature which the waters brought forth." 
Further on (i, 26-28) '' God said: Let us make man, 

and let him have dominion over the fishes of 
the sea and the fowls of the air, and all living creatures 
that move upon the earth. And God created man; 
male and female he created them, and he said to them, 

rule over the fishes of the sea and the fowls of 
the air, and all living creatures that move upon the 
earth." 

In these passages, the animals are evidently men- 
tioned in the order in which they were created. Now 
the fishes and the other aquatic animals precede the 
birds, which, according to the general opinion, belong 
to the fifth day. Hence, these animals were also created 



THE HEXtEMERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 1 53 

on the fifth day; the creation of the exclusively terres- 
trial reptiles was put off till the sixth day. 

Geology confirms in the most expressive manner 
this order of apparition. Indeed it is wrong to con- 
sider the Secondary Epoch as being par excellence the 
epoch of reptiles. The truth of the question is, that 
it was the era of aquatic animals, no matter to which 
class they belong. We believe they did not meet in 
the whole secondary grounds a snake, the only animal 
universahy and at all times looked upon as a reptile. 
The chelonians (turtles), the saurians (hzards), and 
the batrachians (frogs), abound it is true, in these 
grounds, but we know that these three orders are quite 
arbitrarily classed as reptiles, and have very little re- 
semblance to ophidians or serpents, the typical animals 
of the class. The serpents, that is, those, animals which 
are completely deprived of members, are at the bottom, 
the very ones agreed upon, and about which the learned 
and unlearned have always agreed to call reptiles. 
Moses spoke the language of the people, and was not 
bound to adopt the more or less systematic classifica- 
tion of modern savants. We may add more, for it is 
our belief that all the chelonians, saurians and batra- 
chians discovered in the secondary grounds, are more 
or less aquatic species. 

There cannot be any difiicult)^ as to the subject 
of batrachians, for they are almost all amphibious, and 
all breathe through the gills during the first stage of 
their development. Hence, they are not terrestrial 
animals, strictly speaking. Besides, they are quite rare 
in the secondary grounds. We can add that the 
majority of naturalists make a special class of them, 
which thus places them outside of that of reptiles. 



154 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

As to the chelonians or turtles, we can say that they 
confirm the exactitude of the Bibhcal account in the 
most remarkable manner. The marine, fluviatile and 
paludal turtles abound in the secondary grounds, but 
they have not discovered one that is surely and exclu- 
sively terrestrial. 

The saurians found in the same grounds are equally 
aquatic. One finds no difficulty in this respect regard- 
ing two species, the megalosaurus and iguanodon, a 
kind of gigantic lizard, which characterize the Vv^ealden 
formation.^ These two kinds are between lizards and 
crocodiles, and difficult to find out their chief regimen. 
If they were not exclusively acquatic, it is believed 
that they always frequented the water. Hence they 
belonged to the fifth day's creation, and their presence 
m the secondary layers must not surprise us any longer. 

However, let us suppose they would succeed in 
discovering some reptile exclusively terrestrial outside 
the Tertiary grounds wherein they are abundant, what 
then? Nothing would result from this against the 

lO. SIXTH day's work. 

Gen. i, 24-27. (24) ^'- And God said: Let the earth bring forth 
the living creature in its kind., cattle a7id creepijig things, and beasts 
of the earth, according to their hind, and it was so done. (25) And 
God made the beasts of the earth according to their kinds, ajtd cattle 
and everything that creepeth on the earth after its kind, and God saiv 
that it was good. (26) And he said: Let us make men to our image 
and likeness, and let him have dojninion over the fishes of the sea and 
the fowls of the air, a?td the beasts, and the whole earth and every 
creeping thing that moveth upon the earth. (27) And God created 
man to his own image, to the image of God he created hiin, male and 
fetnale, he. created him. ..." 



' In geology the name of a formation extensively developed in 
the Weald of England, and interesting from its position and organic 
remains. 



THE HEX/EMERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 1 55 

exactitude of the Mosaic account. The Secondary 
would be always that of the aquatic animals, and the 
following epoch that of terrestrial animals. 

Moses tells us that on the sixth day God created 
the mam.mifers, at first the animals, and man afterwards. 
This last creation corresponds to the C^nozoic or Ter- 
tiary Age, and also to the Quaternary Age. 

Geologists divide the Tertiary grounds into three 
stages — Eocene or Lower Tertiary (plastic clays, 
rough limestone, gypsum), Miocene or Middle Tertiary 
(pebbly and flinty stone, travertin,^ molasse,^ faluns),^ 
and Pliocene or Upper Tertiary (crags,* Roman and 
sub-Alpine hills). The Tertiary ground is especially 
characterized by nummulites; the Quaternary is charac- 

^ The calcareous deposit from springs which occurs in many 
localities in Italy and extensively quarried for the use of building; 
it is a soft, porous, straw-colored rock, easily wrought when freshly 
quarried, which afterwards hardens and seems durable under the cli- 
mate of Italy. The interior walls of the Colosseum and St. Peter's 
are built of this material. 

^ A name given in Switzerland to an important geological for- 
mation belonging in part to the Miocene, and in part to a position 
lying between the Eocene and Miocene. The formation is in places 
over 6,000 feet thick, and chiefly of lacustrine origin. The fossil 
vegetation of the molasse is of great interest, being sub-tropical in 
character, containing palms of an American type, and also the conif- 
erous genus sequoia, now limited to California. It is the upper 
member of the molasse which contains these plant remains, and this 
part of the series is made up of red sandstones, marls and conglom- 
erate {nagelfluh) . The lower division of the molasse is a sandstone 
containing marine and brakish water shells. 

^ Strata of Miocene or Tertiary Age occurring in Touraine, France. 

^ Certain strata of Pliocene Age found in the southeastern coun- 
tries of England. They consist of sandy and shelly deposits simi- 
lar in character to those now forming in the North Sea, and contains 
the white, red or Suffolk and Norwich, the latter containing many 
bones of the elephant, mastodon, hippopotamus, rhinoceros and 
other large mammals. 



156 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

terized by crags and erratic blocks, the gray and red 
diiuvian; the Bonecaves and osseous breccias.^ 

They occur in widely extended but isolated patches, 
rarely more than fifty feet thick, and have long been 
used for fertiUzing. The rock consists of coarse breccia 
of shells and shell fragments mixed with sand, and in 
places passing into limestone. It also contains numer- 
ous bones of mammals, of species indicating a warmer 
climate than that of the region at the present time. 

The beginning of the Tertiary Age manifests itself 
by the apparition of mammifers, great and small quad- 
rupeds. In the upper part of the Eocene, in the gypsum 
of Paris, we meet the remains of vast herds, composed 
of diverse species of the paleotherium, herbivorous 
animals, a kind of tapir, varying from the dimensions 
of a hare to the thickness of that of a horse; from the 
paleotherium, a kind of hippopotanms, with a horse-like 
form, short legs, and its dimensions varied from those of 
a boar to those of an ass; the xiphodon, chamois, with 
long and slim legs, and a gracefully lengthened neck; 
1)ats, marsupials, reptiles, and a multitude of fishes have 
left their fossil debris in the gypsum and marls of the 
Upper Eocene. 

In the molasse layers and faluns, which are the two 
chief divisions of the Miocene ground, and which form 
a great part of the actual soil, are found traces of the 
First gigantic mammifers, extinct to-day. The dino- 
therium or " terrible animal," the largest of all the 

^ Bone caves and osseous breccias are fissures in tlie old rocks, 
which are open from above, and have been filled up v^^ith fragments 
of bones, teeth of large and small mammals, besides shells, the re- 
mains of plants and wood, pieces of limestone and other rubbish, all 
of which has been cemented into a solid mass by calcareous cement 
or clay. 



THE HEAiEMERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 1 5/ 

terrestrial animals known, was a species of phoca or 
elephant, armed with two hooks of extremely hard 
ivory, which served to dig up the soil for roots and 
bulbs, which formed its chief nourishment. It meas- 
ured about nineteen feet in length. The megatherium, 
a kind of living mountain, and the mylodon, with a 
snout like a hog, and immense claws for tearing up the 
earth. The huge mastodon, larger than the actual 
elephant, with four defenders, of unequal length, 
bent forward so as to reach food readily, roamed the 
marshy lands, or rather lowlands. The dinornis, the 
dodo and the epiornis, gigantic birds of Australia and 
Madagascar, measured over nine feet in height. 

Later in the period which forms the transition of the 
Tertiary to the Quaternary Epoch, the mammifers ap- 
proached more to the species of our days. In 1806, a 
specimen of the mammoth was found at the mouth 
of one of the rivers of Siberia, perfectly preserved in a 
block of ice in which it had perished. Its flesh and hair 
wxre intact, its intestines contained the leaves of the 
larch-tree of Siberia from which it received nourishment, 
and dogs ate of its flesh. It v/as somewhat like an 
elephant, but with wooly hair, long bent and sharp 
teeth, reaching out of its mouth, ears protected by 
long tufts of hair, and a large black mane. Some 
naturalists believe the mammoth still lives in certain 
unexplored boreal regions. The bos primigenius, with 
a massive head, then filled the prairies; the cervus mega- 
ceros, a stag with large horns which measured over nine 
feet in length, and which can be seen in the leading 
museums of Europe; the ursus spelaeus (cave bear), 
etc., animated the plains and forests in early days. 

Finally, man appears when the great mammoth had 



158 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

disappeared, and buried in slime or entombed in ice. 
The majority of geologists locate human fossils only in 
the Quaternary ground. It is only there where we 
find certain traces of his presence. Conformably to 
Genesis, man appeared the last on the stage of creation. 
This is the last confirmation which geology brings for- 
ward in favor of the Biblical account. 

As to the subject of the sixth day's work, we may 
add to what has been said before in regard to some 
interpreters, who have attributed to the fifth day, the 
creation of reptiles, correctly speaking. The proof that 
there was question only of the aquatic animals is shown 
by the word remesh, employed on the sixth day, un- 
questionably designates terrestrial reptiles. 

Some commentators have applied this word to all 
the small terrestrial animals, even mammals, such as 
the hare and marten. Perhaps they are right, but it 
is impossible to furnish proof of this. The sacred writer, 
in the concise and rapid enumeration of the sixth day's 
work, may have overlooked or neglected to mention 
these small animals, just as he neglected speaking of the 
fishes. 

It is useless to insist on the precision of the distinc- 
tion regarding the two acts which gave rise successively 
to animals and to man. It is proof that our species is 
not naturally derived from anterior species, as certain 
transformists endeavor to make us believe. It is ex- 
pressly said that man was created {bard), a significant 
word which thus far has been only employed in two 
important circumstances, one of which we find in the 
first verse with regard to the creation of matter, and in 
the other, the twenty-first verse, to announce the advent 
of the first animal. Hence when the Bible does not 



THE HEX^MERON OR THE SIX GENETIC DAYS. 1 59 

directly contradict the theory of Evolution, limited to 
plants and animals, it does not permit to apply the same 
to man. 

II. SEVENTH DAY. 

It is said in the beginning of the second chapter of 
Genesis, that God rested on the seventh day, that is. 
He ceased to create immediately after the apparition 
of man. Here too, science confirms the inspired text 
in the most expressive manner. In proving that man 
had lived since the Quaternary Epoch or Post PHocene 
it has equally proved that all the animals which sur- 
round us, have existed since this epoch. Several 
species have disappeared since the creation of man, but 
no new species have appeared. 

CONCLUSION. 

The Mosaic cosmogony and the natural sciences 
are in accord, particularly in their main features. Thus, 
science — true science — must ever be in accord with 
the Mosaic cosmogony, because God the Creator could 
not permit a real contradiction or conflict between 
His revelation and the creation itself. If one observes 
striking difference between the Mosaic account and the 
discoveries of science, it is certain that Holy Writ 
is wrongly interpreted, or that .science has not dem- 
onstrated beyond possibility of doubt, the question 
at issue. Hence, we may safely say, there is no 
contradiction, no necessary conflict between the two. 
We have shown this in the present work, and the reader 
cannot help but admire this striking harmony. 

" AVhen we compare the scientific accounts with the 
Biblical history of the creation," says Phaff, " we see 
that this latter harmonizes with tliese accounts as much 



l60 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

as one has the right to expect. Indeed, we discover 
in both science and the Bible, the same kingdoms, 
equally distinct in themselves, by not keeping account 
of the historical changes they might have undergone; 
the chronological following of their apparition is ex- 
actly given by Moses. The primitive chaos, the earth 
covered at first by the waters, emerging afterwards; the 
formation of the inorganic kingdom, followed by the 
vegetable reign, then of the animal kingdom which has 
for its first representatives the animals living in the 
water, and, after them, the terrestrial animals; finally 
man appearing the last of all; such is really the succes- 
sion of the beings, such are really the diverse periods 
of the history of creation, periods designated under the 
name of days." 

What must we conclude from this? '' We can ob- 
serve," says Dana, our eminent American geologist, 
'' that if the (Mosaic) document is true — and it is true, 
because the order of the events in the cosmogony of 
Scripture corresponds essentially with that which is 
given (by geology) — it follows that it is of divine origin. 
For no human intelligence has been witness of the 
events, and no human intelligence in the primitive age 
of the world, at least if it had not b^en endowed with 
a supernatural penetration, could have invented such 
an arrangement; it would never have placed the creation 
of the sun, source of the earth's light, so long after the 
creation of the light, on the fourth day, and what is 
equally singular, ])etween the creation of the plants 
and the animals, although- this astre may be as im- 
portant for the first as for the second. Neither could 
anybody have reached to the depths of the philosophy 
which manifests itself in this plan. . . . The Bibli- 



MAN FROM THE SCIENTIFIC POINT OF VIEW. l6l 

cal account is profoundly philosophical in the tableaux 
by which it presents the creation to us. It is at once 
true and divine. It is a declaration on the first page 
of the sacred volume, that both the creation and the 
Bible have the same author. Here there cannot be any 
real conflict between the two books of the great Author. 
Both are revelations which He made to man." ^ 



CHAPTER VIII. 



MAN FROM THE SCIENTIFIC POINT OF VIEW. 

ONE denies to-day, in the name of a false science, all 
that Holy Scripture teaches about the first man. 
It is our object to answer briefly to all the difliculties 
they allege against the Sacred Books in treating the 
three following questions: 

I. Was the first man an intermediary being between 
the animal and actual man? 2. Was he a savage? 
3. In what epoch did he make his appearance? 

I. The Animal Origin of Man. 

For the adherents of Monism, who admit the evolu- 
tionary theory with all its consequences, and reject all 
idea of creation, there has not been, properly speaking, 
a first man. Evolution which has ended by giving to 
one or several animals, placed amidst favorable condi- 
tions, the traits which distinguish us, has been so insen- 
sible, that it is impossible not onl}^ to fix the date of the 

' J. D. Dana, " Manual of Geology," 2 ed. pp. 767-770. 
D. B.— II 



1 62 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

appearance of our species, but even to tell of an indi- 
vidual that he was its first representative. The chief 
adept of contemporary Darwinism, Ha^ckel, a professor 
in the University of Yena, Germany, formally tells us: 
" This passage has been so slow that one cannot speak 
at all of a first man." 

Haeckel teaches, however, that the species which 
preceded ours, and to which we owe existence, belonged 
to the family of apes, the first of the order of quadru- 
manes. The man-ape, whom they have called more 
learnedly the pithecanthropus or the anthropopithecus 
(of Mortillet), would have lived about the end of the 
Tertiary Epoch, perhaps even earlier, according to M. 
de Mortillet. who attributes to him the so-called worked 
flints of the Miocene layers of Thenay, France. It was 
an anthropoid, a brother of the actual anthropoids, but 
more similar to man by his anatomical or physiological 
characters; for nobody pretends to-day to make us 
derive from apes which belong to the contemporary 
fauna, so considerable is the distance that separates us 
from them. 

The opinion of Darwin, author of the evolutionary 
system most in vogue, does not differ in this respect 
from that of his disciple Haeckel. He also makes us 
descend from an anthropomorphous ape. According 
to Darwin it was a hairy mammifer, endowed with a 
tail and pointed ears, which undoubtedly lived on trees 
and dwelt in the ancient continent. 

Not all the adversaries of the creation of man make 
us descend from the ape. yVccording to a great number 
of them this honor would be still too great to attribute 
to us this origin; we have to look for our ancestors 
among the lowest marsupials or didelphydse. At least 



MAN FROM THE SCIENTIFIC POINT OF VIEW. 1 63 

they claim that the laws which preside at the general 
development of the beings are opposed to our origin 
from some quadrumane. This opinion is shared by the 
Professors Huxley, of England, Fillippi, of Italy, and 
Vogt, of Geneva, although the latter seems sometimes 
to attribute to us for ancestors the actual ape, for he 
said that he " rather preferred to be a perfectioned ape 
than a degenerated Adam." 

Hence we have to do rather with the animal origin 
of man than with his simian origin. However, this 
point matters little; for, whatever may be the different 
views that separate them with regard to the human 
genealogy, our adversaries have recourse to the same 
arguments when there is question to prove their general 
thesis — the descent of man from some inferior type. 
The arguments alleged that vve descend from some ani- 
mal species are of three kinds : i . The general conforma- 
tion of the body of man; 2. The development of the 
human embryo; 3. The presence in man of the rudi- 
mentary organs; 4. Intellectual qualities. 

I. PHYSICAL DIFFERENCE BETWEEN MAN AND BRUTE. 
— UPRIGHT POSITION. 

Vegetative and sensitive life is common to man and 
animals. For this reason man's organization is very 
similar to that of the animal. The organs and method 
of nutrition, respiration, and propagation are the same 
in man and the higher mammals. Neither is there any 
essential difference in the action of the senses. ' Thus, 
the sense of touch, the yellow speck of the retina, the 
iris in the apple of the eye, and the ear lobule, are shared 
by man with the anthropoid ape. Nevertheless, the 



1 64 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

physical difference between man and the highest animal 
(the anthropoid ape) is greater than the physical differ- 
ence between any two closely allied animals. Man's 
entire build and habitus are essentially different from 
those of the animal. If man was not created in his 
present fully-developed condition, then he is a product 
of historical evolution in every organ and system of his 
complex body, and in the uniform spiritual develop- 
ment that has accompanied the corporal development. 
In several animals this or that organ or sense is more 
perfect than in man; but no animal can compare with 
man's organization as a whole. One chief difference 
is man's attitude and gait. '' Man alone," says Aris- 
totle, '^ among living beings walks with head upright. 
To make his upper parts light and easy to carry, nature 
removed the weight from the above and placed it below. 
Hence, his thighs and haunches and the calves of his 
legs are covered with flesh, and he is without a tail. 
The nutrition goes in the direction of these parts, in 
order to clothe them wath flesh." Aristotle is undoubt- 
edly right in making man's upright bearing the key- 
stone of his entire organization. The lower extremities 
were lengthened, and their supports strengthened, 
while the upper extremities were dispensed from loco- 
motion, and fitted up into an organ of all work. The 
hand, that organ of organs, as Aristotle calls it, with 
its thumb turned inwards, has a suppleness and dainti- 
ness of sense unrivaled by any organ of the animal 
kingdom. Apes have, it is true, four hands; but as all 
four are locomotory, they have none of that nimble- 
ness and flexibility which are peculiar to the human 
hand. Anthropoid apes occasionally lay hold of stones 
and clubs in self defense; but this is the highest use to 



MAX FROxM THE SCIENTIFIC POINT OF VIEW. 1 65 

which they put their hands. There is also a consider- 
able difference in the relative lengths. The arm of the 
ape is disproportionately longer than the human arm. 
Neither has any man a prehensile foot, although 
savages are sometimes credited with it. But the story 
is just as fabulous as the fiction which represents men 
with tails. Anthropology and ethnography have no 
information of man's capacity to turn his toes inwards 
like an ape. ]\Ian can, it is true, in exceptional circum- 
stances, write or paint with his feet; still the foot never 
becomes prehensile. The relations of the several parts 
(e. g. toes) are very different in men and apes. The 
proportion of the shin bone to the foot is as 82.5 to 
52.9 in man, and as 80 to 72.8 in the chimpanzee. 

2. FACIAL AND CEREBRAL FORMATION. 

Connected with man's upright bearing is his facial 
and cerebral formation. The position of the nose and 
jaw determines the form of the face. The more the 
jaw protrudes, the greater the animal tendency to sensi- 
ble pleasure which, on the contrary, is in inverse ratio 
to the frontal and nasal projections. The high fore- 
head too, stamps the human face as something more 
than miaterial. Since the days of Camper the relation 
between forehead and jaw has been regulated by the 
facial angle, the lines of vdiich pass over the highest 
part of the forehead and the middle of the orifice of the 
ear and meet in the upper front teeth. In normal skulls 
the facial angle varies from 75 deg. to 85 deg. In the 
Caucasian race 90 deg. is not infrequent, while in races 
low down in^the scale, and in idiots, the average falls as 
low as 70 deg. These lower numbers, however, are 



l66 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

uncertain. In any case the lowest outside limit must be 
set down at 64 deg. The facial angle averages 35 deg. 
in a full-grown chimpanzee and 30 deg. in the orang- 
outang. When these apes are in their youth their facial 
anele comes much nearer to that of man. Then it 
reaches 60 deg. and 64 deg., but youth cannot be taken 
as the standard, because the jaw^ is only fully developed 
as age advances. 

3. VOLUME OF THE BRAIN. 

'' In proportion to his size," says Aristotle, " man 
has more brain than all living beings, and men have 
more than women." Aristotle's words still hold good. 
In size and richness of convolution man's brain is 
superior to that of all animals, apes included. The 
size of the brain may be determined by measuring either 
the upper surface or the inner space of the skull — the 
latter being the easier and surer method. Then an 
estimate is made of the weight of the contents. To 
obtain a sure result many measurements have to be 
made. According to Morton, the maximum size of 
the skull varies between 11 2. 5 and yy cubic inches; 
whereas the minimum size oscillates between 91 and 58. 
The mean is 96 to 75.3, and the average ranges from 
93.5 and 80.3. If we allow the limit of 63 cubic inches 
assigned by Morton, man's skull has still the very 
considerable balance in its favor of 34.5, as compared 
with the largest gorilla skull. Some of the great 
mammals have absolutely a far larger brain than man, 
but in proportion to the weight of his body man scores 
a decided advantage. Man's brain compared with his 
total weight is as 2 to 47; the dolphin's is as i to 66; and 
the elephant's i to 500. The importance of this fact 



MAN FROM THE SCIENTIFIC POINT OF VIEW. 1 6/ 

should not be overrated, since in birds the proportion 
is even smaller than in man, being as i to 14 in the 
greenfinch; still it is not wholly devoid of significance 
as regards man and apes. A full-sized gorilla or orang- 
outang is nearly doubly as heavy as a Bushman or as 
many a woman, but his brain is at least one-third hghter 
than the smallest human brain. Even the lowest 
human skulls, those of the Papuans, are far ahead of the 
skulls of the highest apes, even morphologically. His- 
tory also bears witness to the distinctive character of 
the human skeleton in general, and of the human skull 
in particular. Modern peoples are branded with the 
characteristic peculiarities of their forefathers. Not a 
single skeleton that has been discovered differs from 
our own in formation. Nowhere are we on the trail 
of an abnormal formation or impeded development. 
Doubtless -strange specimens existed then as now, and 
were as exceptional in olden times as they are now. 
The skull capacity is the same in all. 

4. EMBRYOLOGY. 

The argument drawn from the embryogenic devel- 
opment moves us little. It is true that man starts by 
an tgg, like all animals. To believe Hseckel, the human 
embryo, in its development, would be by turn a 
zoophyte, fish batrachian, reptile and mammal; but 
these pretended successive states are more than con- 
testable, and, even if they were real, they would have 
no bearing on the origin of man. 

First they are contestable. It is not sufficient, 
indeed, that Haeckel affirms them in order that we may 
be convinced thereof. We know that good faith is 



1 68 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

not the dominant quality of the German naturalist. 
To-clay it is admitted by everybody that, in order to 
render more striking the resemblance of the embryos 
of man and the animal, he greatly altered the cuts which 
pretend to represent them in one of his books. The 
striking resemblances there depicted are, therefore, in 
reality the result of a fraud. In his turn, Doctor 
Jousset establishes " an enormous difference " between 
the human embryo depicted in his book and that which 
is represented in the " Encyclopedique Dictionnaire des 
Sciences Medicales." 

According to the judgment of the most competent 
naturalists the smiiiarities appealed to are .purely 
illusive. That there are certain analogies between the 
successive stages through which the human embryo 
passes and the different groups of the animal series, 
we do not contest, and this is quite natural, .because in 
both cases there is a progress from the simple to the 
complex; but from the analogy to a complete resem- 
blance it is pretty far. " In no moment of his exist- 
ence,'' teaches a famous anatomist, Gratiolet, '' does 
man resemble any other species. ... In all the 
epochs of the foetal hfe, man is man in power, and 
dehnite characters distinguish him." " The forms of 
the embryo have a wonderful relation with the future 
forms," says the same anatomist; ''they complicate 
themselves, it is true, but according to a specific mode; 
in all the epochs, the future man foretells himself. 
. . . A fundamental difference notably distinguishes 
the primitive forms of the encephalon of man in the em- 
bryogenic state from those presented by the lower 
animals arrived at their definitive term; it consists in 
the peculiar incurvations at the nervous axle of the 



MAN FROM THE SCIENTIFIC POINT OF VIEW. 1 69 

encephalic hood of the embryo. . . . In no epoch, 
is the brain of the human foetus similar to that of an 
ape; on the contrary, the more it becomes developed 
the more the difference appears." (" Cf. Anatomic 
comparee du Systeme Nerveux," p. 251, 248, 253.) 

Although these are facts, and not merely personal 
impressions, one might object that Gratiolet permitted 
himself to be influenced by his prejudices favorable to 
the fixity of the species, and to the superiority of the 
human nature. One will not make the same reproach 
to Carl Vogt, one of the champions of Evolutionism 
and of free thought. Now, Carl Vogt protests still 
more energetically than Gratiolet against the pretended 
similarities of the human embryo and the lower animals. 
" It has been supposed," he says, " that the embryos 
pass in abridgment the same phases which the stem 
passed during its development through the geological 
epochs. It was my belief for a long time that this law 
was well founded, but it is absolutely false in its basis. 
A careful study of embryology shows us, indeed, that 
there exists a certain harmony among them, but that 
they differ in their development." Also, Agassiz says: 
" It has been maintained in the broadest terms that 
superior animals pass, during their development, 
through all the phases which characterize inferior 
classes. Thus formulated, this proposition is entirely 
contrary to truth. ... In their primitive con- 
dition the eggs of all animals are alike, but as soon as 
the embryo begins to show characteristic traits, these 
reveal such peculiarities that the type of the animal 
can be distinguished." " On the Species," pp. 278-279. 

The ovules of mammals in their primitive state 
resemble one another, so that they cannot be physically 



I/O DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

distinguished, and nevertheless, an ovule in the course 
of its development may become a horse, a dog, or a 
whale. Therefore, there must be in the ovule a special 
principle, a something which distinguishes its physical 
composition, although in the present state of our knowl- 
edge, and with the resources at present within our reach, 
this escapes the eye of the naturalist; it being impossi- 
ble to ascertain these physical diiTerences on account of 
the imperfection of our senses. 

5. RUDIMENTARY ORGANS. 

The rudimentary organs will retain us less long. 
One can maintain of these organs what we have said 
of the pretended embryogenic phases: they have neither 
the importance nor the signification one attributes to 
them. Their presence in man can be explained by the 
simple consideration that all the organized beings are 
subject to the same physiological laws. 

The argument they bring forward has the defect of 
proving too much. The rudimentary organs are so 
numerous and so different in man, they approach in this 
respect so many animals in which they are completely 
developed, that, if they would suppose an identity of 
origin, we would have to conclude that man has anteri- 
orly passed through all the classes of the various verte- 
brates. Now who will believe, for instance, that he 
counts birds among his ancestors because man in his 
embryogenic state possesses their nictating membrane? 
One would arrive at still more strange consequences, 
if one would persist in beholding in these rudiments a 
remainder of developed organs and utilized in an 
anterior state. The atrophied breasts which the males 



MAN FROM THE SCIENTIFIC POINT OF VIEW. I /I 

possess in the class of the mammifers are first-class rudi- 
mentary organs, and the most striking of all. Must 
we conclude from this that the males were formerly 
females? These rudimentary organs are common 
among the animals, and until at present it entered no- 
body's mind to behold in them the traces of an anterior 
state. Thus the whale possesses teeth which ncA-er 
arrive in piercing the gums. It is the same with the 
incisives with which the calf is endowed in its foetal 
state. Must we conclude from this that the whale and 
the ox have passed through anterior states when they 
had the teeth of which they are wanting to-day? The 
Evolutionists themselves would hardly dare to affirm 
this. 

When Darwin considers the rudimentary organs as 
useless, he tells something which is not by any means 
proved. Indeed, we are far from knowing perfectly the 
functions of all the parts of organized beings. It is, 
therefore, very possible that all the rudimentary organs, 
like the wings of the apteryx, serve an end which is 
unknown to us. The uniformity of plan adopted by 
the Creator in His works may very well explain the 
presence of organs without apparent use in some 
animals, whatever the Transformists may say. God 
has impressed in them in some manner the seal of their 
parentage. '' Instead of being an argument in favor of 
evolution,'' remarks Agassiz, '' does not the existence 
of a rudimentary eye discovered by Doctor J. Wyman 
in a fish {amblyopsis spelaeus) of the mammoth cave 
of Kentucky, prove rather that this animal, like all 
others, had been created with all its peculiar character- 
istics by the fiat of the Almighty, and that this rudi- 
mentarv eve has been left to it as a reminiscence of the 



1/2 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

general plan of structure on which is constructed the 
grand type to which it belongs." 

Other drawbacks to the human organism tell as 
little in favor of evolution or rather of '' natural selec- 
tion," as the advantages. The most striking is the 
absence of a tail. For this deficiency no sufficient 
reason can be assigned, as man is quite singular in this 
respect. The incipient tail in the foetus shows at most 
a disposition, without giving any clue to its deterio- 
ration. Want of use is insufficient to account for it. 
The coiling tail could be dispensed with, if the animal 
had gradually exchanged its climbing propensities for 
walking, but many monkeys still climb and use their 
tails. Evolutionists, to be consistent, must hold that 
the coiling tail was transformed into a walking organ. 
Many land animals, in spite of living on land, walk on 
all fours, and yet have a tail which renders good service 
in other ways besides climbing. This change in their 
mode of life would have either destroyed or improved 
the tail, as may be seen from the -ape's clumsy walk on 
level ground, and the waddle of the gorilla supporting 
himself on his bended hands. 

Take again the want of a hairy coat. It is admitted 
that selection could not have dictated its abandonment, 
since the man without hair has less chance of withstand- 
ing the climate, and enduring wind and weather. If 
it be universally true that the organism which is simple 
and developed all round is better adapted for the strug- 
gle for life than the organism which is complex and has 
only one-sided development, then the want of a fur 
coat cannot be explained on the principles of selection. 
On such principles it would indeed be most surprising 
if a hairy coating were not formed, since the disposition 



MAN FROM THE SCIENTIFIC POINT OF VIEW. 1 73 

is already there (the embryo being covered with down) 
and individuals have a luxuriant growth of hair in 
various parts. Then, too, what a bulwark it is against 
the subtle encroachments of climate? Sexual selection 
does not lift us out of the bog. If hairness were univer- 
sal, how could a stray male with less hair be an attrac- 
tion to a female, or vice versa ? But, letting that pass, 
we would further ask, how this fashion was enabled to 
gain the ascendant, and to extirpate all hairy individuals 
in the teeth of the fact that hairness is useful in the 
struggle for life? We are crediting our great animal 
ancestors with advanced .-esthetic tastes that are hardly 
to be found among modern savages. Nor can the beard 
which occurs in animals also, be explained in this way. 
For it would be too exacting to expect esthetic females 
to renounce the beard as well as the hairy coating. 
Each race, as Darwin says, has a predilection for those 
characteristic peculiarities which have been gradual in 
their growth. And Wallace rightly thinks that a hairy 
race would have admired great hairness as much as 
modern bearded races admire a fine bushy beard. Thus 
a liking for partial hairlessness would have been as rare 
and as abnormal as a preference for partial baldness, 
or for the few straggling hairs of which women can 
boast. No effect could follow from an individual having 
a taste for such an abnormal peculiarity. But it is in 
the highest degree improbable that such a fashion 
should have become a general favorite with our semi- 
human forefathers and resulted in total hairlessness. 
Such a phenomenon is without parallel in the history 
of the animal kingdom. The '' porcupine " man, the 
descendants of an Englishman of Euston Hall, Suffolk, 
who was covered with warts half an inch long and as 



174 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

thick as a string, dried out in the third generation. Ex- 
tinction is the lot of all monstrosities. To build a 
calculation on them is to build science on the extreme 
edge of hazard. The abnormal succumbs to the normal. 
Man is not, on the whole, so well accoutered for the 
battle of life as the anim.al. He is more sensitive to 
wind and weather, and a prey to many maladies. His 
diet is limited. When he first comes into the world, 
he is more helpless than any other organic being. He 
needs the support of his parents longer. Is this the 
outcome of the struggle for existence? Surely this 
cannot be the goal of its ambition! " Man can provide 
himself with food and raiment from animals and plants," 
says St. Thomas, " since he presupposes both." Hence, 
nature leaves him naked, because he can clothe himself. 
Nature supplies him with no food but milk, because he 
can procure other food for himself. Supposing the 
difference between man and animal to be as represented 
above, this is the simple explanation of man's present 
condition. For man has, indeed, the power to set 
nature at defiance and bid her do her worst. He can 
procure for himself the best of food and clothing; he 
can till the ground and make fire his servant; he can 
make his armor proof against all nature's shafts, and 
can forge for himself weapons that enable him to hold 
the field against all comers. But the need in itself is 
not enough. Man must have also the capacity to use 
them. It is arguing in a circle to say that the needs 
of living organisms are gratified for the same reason 
that they exist. There is a recognized limit to the need 
of animals. Many faculties which seem to supply a 
need, are really born of instinct and desire. The spider 
weaves its web from pleasure, not from hunger, and the 



MAN FROM THE SCIENTIFIC POINT OF VIEW. 1 75 

bird sings from sexual excitement. Hence, we are 
led to suppose the existence of a spiritual element in 
man. 

The physical differences between men and animals 
should not, however, be exaggerated. Nor should 
they be underrated in such a statement as the following: 
" In form, in build, and throughout his organic tenden- 
cies man is an ape." For not only is the similarity not 
proven, but the spiritual activity for which the organ- 
ism is destined involves physical differences. It cannot 
have been, in the first instance, the product of educa- 
tion. Education can work wonders, but it cannot 
change the natures and peculiarities of the human 
species. Physiology and morphology have not yet 
succeeded in laying hands on the parents that gave 
birth to the first human being. The scouts of science 
have explored the whole earth, but they can find only 
men and anirrials. Their search for a being half man 
and half animal has been fruitless; they were never even 
on the track. Even the Bushmen are men, and not 
semi-apes. So far, as Wallace, Huxley and Virchow 
allow, the excavations of science have brought no fossil- 
ape-skull or skull of a man-ape that can have belonged 
to a human being. Even the oldest skulls that have 
been found are human. '' Dolicocephalic or brachy- 
cephalic," says Quatrefages, 'Marge or small, orthog- 
nathous or prognathus, quaternary man is always man 
in the full acceptance of the word. Whenever the 
remains have been sufficient to enable us to form an 
opinion, we have found the hand and the foot which 
characterized our species; the vertebral column has dis- 
played the double curvature. . . . The more we study 
the subject, the more are we convinced that every bone 



176 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

of the skeleton, from the most massive to the smallest, 
carries with it in its form and proportions, a certificate 
of origin which it is impossible to mistake." The crude 
theory of Vogt, according to which man is descended 
from one of the extant kinds of anthropoid apes, must 
be set down as obsolete. For the human body has but 
few similarities with the -highest representatives of 
this class, that is, with the Asiatic orang-outang, the 
gibbon, the African chimpanzee and gorilla. 

The hairy pithecanthropos primigenius is accepted 
by Hseckel and Darwin as the common progenitor of 
man and gorilla. '' Both male and feraale wore beards. 
Their ears were probably pointed and moveable. A tail 
hung from the body. Veins and nerves took a different 
course. A first parents, too, had prehensile feet, climbed 
trees, and inhabited a warm well-wooded country." At 
a still earlier period they must have been water-animals, 
for the lung is a modified swimming bladder. The 
traces of our primitive forefathers lie not on the earth 
but under the earth. Africa is the spot selected by 
Darwin and Huxley; Haeckel prefers southern Asia, 
but suggests the Indian Ocean as an alternative; 
Lemuria is its name. So this hypothesis, alas! has 
tumbled overboard into the sea. Hence, Darwinians 
are forced to admit that the animal forms, to which 
they ascribe the origin of the human race, have long 
since perished. Not even a bone has yet been found. 

6. INTELLECTUAL QUALITIES — SPEECH. 

Articulate speech and man's erect attitude are said 
to be the chief proof that the human organism has 
undergone an essential change morphologically. These 



MAN FROM THE SCIENTIFIC POINT OF VIEW. 1 77 

two physiological functions ought to have produced 
great morphological changes, and to have given a spurt 
to the development of the powers of the soul. From 
speechless or pithecoid man to rational man a complete 
transition has been effected, owing, it is said, to the 
acquisition of language as the articulate expression of 
words and concepts. But the begging of the question 
is so shining and so evident that it will glimmer through 
a blind man's eye. Surely the upright position and 
language must themselves be accounted for before they 
are made a stepping-stone to evolution. The upright 
position is universal among men, and universally absent 
in apes. If the perfection of brain and larynx is depend- 
ent on the evolution of speech, then a properly 
developed larynx and brain must be the companions of 
speech that already exists. But how did these arise? 
The '' gradual acquisition of the upright position " is 
not proved, nor has it anything whatever to do with 
the organs of speech. However, even if this unwar- 
ranted assumption be let pass unchallenged, it has still 
to be explained hov/ vocal organs, intended originally 
for the production of rude inarticulate sounds, have 
been made capable of speech. If this change was pre- 
ceded by a partial formation or transformation of parts 
of the brain, the puzzle has veered round to its first 
position. Not the faintest ray of light breaks through 
the mysterious darkness. Man is man only by speech; 
to have speech he must be already man. How comes 
it that only this branch of the original tree has "luckily" 
been able to adapt itself to this development? One 
would suppose now, that it would be much easier for 
the other branch to grow to the same height since in 

man who walks erect and speaks, it has before its eyes 
D. B— 13 



1/8 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

a fine model and excellent instruction. But all the 
efforts of selection and education have been unavailing 
to train man's first cousin to walk upright or to talk. 
He is and remains a climber, in nowise a homo alalus 
but a simia alala. 

In speech lies the broadest and most powerful dis- 
tinction between man and the brute. No brute has 
speech; no properly developed man is without it. Man 
speaks, but no animal has ever uttered a word. Speech 
is our Rubicon, and no animal will dare to cross it. 
Speech is the great distinguishing feature of man. Ani- 
mals are speechless because they are thoughtless. 

•*. 

7. CONSCIENCE. 

Besides language, and other manifestations of 
intellect, there are identical moral characters which are 
wanting in no human race. Conscience is there, with 
its rewards and its remorses, its hopes and its fears, the 
same that have inspired the white-robed army of heroes 
and martyrs; the heroes in thought and action, the 
martyrs to honor or to truth. 

Here, too, we have been rudely awakened to the 
fact that the moral problem contained in the beautiful 
sentiments of conscience has been solved by that intru- 
sive species of modern science, as with the touch of a 
master. An eminent observer points to his dog, in the 
act of refraining from eating his master's dinner, when 
it might. See, says the master, there is the moral senti- 
ment, in its first stage of evolution — conscience in 
embryo! Such Is the explanation vouchsafed as for 
the moral order and its origin; and It is an explanation, 
we must confess, which suggests pregnant reflections. 



MAN FROM THE SCIENTIFIC POINT OF VIEW. 1 79 

They become more fertile still upon the further state- 
ment being contributed to the question, that the dog 
looks up to its master as its god? A compliment, 
indeed! though not so disinterested as you might think, 
if the master meanwhile is looking back at the brute as 
his progenitor. 

8. RELIGION. 

We have no proofs of man's aboriginal belief in a 
God, the Darwinists tell us. '' Fear of the super- 
natural," says Vogt, '' of the unknown, the germ of 
rehgious ideas, is found developed in a high degree in 
our intelligent animals, the dog and the horse; men only 
developed these farther, and formed them into a system 
of faith. Lawgivers and priests invented the belief in 
a God." Had the belief in a Supreme Being, and the 
desire to know more about Him, not dwelt in man, 
neither lawgivers nor priests could have spoken at all 
about God: and if they had done so, nobody would have 
understood them. No nation or tribe has yet been 
found that had not some idea of religion and of the 
Supreme Being. Even the poor Andaman Islanders, 
who were once considered the missing link between 
man and the ape, have ideas about a God which are 
superior to those held by the Romans. 

Let us pass to our second question: 

II. Has the Primitive Man Been a Savage. 

From the foregoing it can be seen that it is not 
probable that man, intellectually and morally, is a 
physical evolution from the brute. Ethnography has 
blown to atoms Rousseau's ideal child of nature. But 



l8o DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

the Darwinian substitute, namely, speechless primitive 
man, the brutal savage, we have to subject to a further 
inquiry. Little as the savage is an ideal of innocence, 
from his birth he is and remains a man. Every man 
has something of the animal in his nature; the savage 
has a greater quantity and a grosser kind, but he is still 
a human animal. Characteristic peculiarities crop up 
at every turn. Australians and Tasmanians, Botocudos 
and Pescheros in South America, Bushmen in South 
Africa, are all men, whichever is to have the device 
" Lower Race " emblazoned on its banner. So little 
was known of the earth in the days of Lucretius that 
there is some excuse for his hazarding the hypothesis 
that aboriginal man was a semi-animal, using neither 
fire nor clothing. Now, however, the earnest student 
cannot plead the backward state of knowledge. Dar- 
win's blunder in relation to the people of Terra del 
Fuego, which first brought home to him the idea of 
man's animal origin, was corrected long ago. No peo- 
ple is destitute of certain abilities and capacities, which 
are the sign of a free intelligence. To this even prehis- 
toric science bears witness. The carved bones of wild 
animals found in the south of France and in the cave 
of Thainger reveal a fairly developed aesthetic sense, 
and a delicacy of artistic skill for which we seek in vain 
among modern savages. The same thing may be ob- 
served in America. The old mound-builders were 
more civilized than modern Indians, who were more 
civilized at the Spanish Conquest than they are now. 
The Lidians are a degenerated race. The arms and 
implements used by them in the Stone Age were doubt- 
less rude and primitive; but to this day no animal has 
attempted to manufacture or use such weapons, rude 



MAN FROM THE SCIENTIFIC POINT OF VIEW. l8l 

as they were. The ideas that form the basis of social 
and moral life are familiar to all peoples. A certain 
social organization and tribal divisions obtained even 
among the most primitive races. The drawings above 
alluded to (which are modeled from nature) are suggest- 
ive and significant. So far only one small detached 
figure, representing a sort of Venus impudica, has been 
discovered. In museums may be seen crowds of such 
objects that have come down to us from the Greeks 
and Romans, whose advanced civilization is beyond 
question. Savages have the idea of Mine and Thine 
and of good and evil, although they both steal and 
work evil. A little while ago an effort was made to 
forge an intermediate link between man and animals 
out of the Mincopians of the Andaman Islands who, 
represented as cannibals, are wholly devoid of moral and 
religious ideas. It has, however, since transpired that 
they have a horror before human flesh, believe in a life 
to come, devoutly worship their ancestors, and are 
superior to many civilized nations in morality. The 
same may be said of the inhabitants of the Nicobar, 
who were visited by the Novara Expedition. Many 
wild and uncivilized peoples are no doubt sitting in 
darkness, but the darkness should not be artfully inten- 
sified. Their ignorance and moral depravity are pitiful 
and harrow up the soul, but the traces and germs of 
civilization must not be passed over and ignored. The 
responsibility of savagery, then, need not rest with 
man's animal origin; for savagery must be regarded in 
great measure as a degradation and a decadence. This 
will be apparent when it is shown that the different 
races of mankind have a common origin. History 
states that many nations, Egyptians, Syrians, Persians, 



1 82 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

and other Asiatic tribes have actually relapsed into bar- 
barism from a high state of civilization. The ruins of 
Egypt, Mexico, and South America, and the monu- 
ments recently discovered at Yukatan, are a clear proof 
that the career of some nations has taken a downward 
course. In the seventh century the barbarians of Cen- 
tral Asia were highly civilized. The Redskins have 
retained a fairly pure notion of religion, but among 
other races in the same part of the globe civilization has 
given way to idolatry and human sacrifice. Faith and 
science both declare that man's condition in the begin- 
ning was purer and nobler than at present. Thus races 
degenerate, although progress is the general law. 
A backward and forward movement may be seen going 
on side by side. The organic connection is often want- 
ing, but it is of no moment in the universal history. 
But the mere power of man is inadeqiiate to explain 
this progressive tendency even in the remotest periods. 
Thus the difference between palaeolithic and neolithic 
is considerable. Domestic animals have taken the 
place of cave animals; the nomad has become a settler, 
and the huntsman has turned husbandman. Shapeless 
arms and implements have been cast aside for polished 
axes that would do credit to a modern artificer. 
Dolmens (stone erections) and menhirs (monoliths) were 
erected as temples or sepulchral monuments; nets were 
plaited, garments woven, and houses more securely 
built. What is the cause of this vast difference? 
Such advanced culture was not within the unaided reach 
of the cave men, and of those whose remains have been 
foimd in the quaternary strata. In many places immi- 
grations were frequent. Whence came the new 
settlers? Whence their civilization? PaUeontology 



MAN FROM THE SCIENTIFIC POINT OF VIEW. 1 83 

can give no answer to these questions. The Science 
of Language comes nearer the mark, but it also halts 
before arriving at the beginning. 

III. Antiquity of Man. 

Since Holy Scripture nowhere tells the age of 
the earth, we are not directly called upon to deal with 
the random calculations of palaeontologists. As long 
as it was customary to interpret the days of creation 
as ordinary days, the earth and the human race were 
naturally supposed to be coeval; now, however, that it is 
fashionable to lengthen the days into periods, or take 
them as merely formal determinants, the partnership is 
dissolved. And yet paleontology has still some voice 
in the calculations. The swollen figures given by 
geologists and palaeontologists are still pregnant with 
mischief. Moreover, it should not be forgotten that 
palaeontological explorations brought to light the first 
traces' of man by unearthing human fossil remains, and 
by giving an insight into prehistoric man's mode of 
Hfe. 

Human fossil remains were first discovered at 
Canstadt in 1701, part of a human skull being found 
in the clay, imbedded in mammoth remains. In 1774 
the cave of Gailenreuth yielded a human jawbone and 
shoulder blade. In 1835, three human skeletons were 
discovered in the cave of Enghis on the Meuse, and 
many others were found in a cave of England on the 
opposite bank of the Meuse, with the bones of the 
mammoth, rhinoceros, great bear, and other such an- 
cient animals as their companions. A skull was found 
at Neanderthal near Elberfeld in 1856, and the right 



1 84 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

half of a human lower jaw, with its row of teeth, in the 
sandpit of Moulin-Quignon, near Abbeville, in 1863. 
Many other discoveries followed, especially in France. 
In 1866 the district of Soloutre in the Maconnais 
Department, so bristled with discoveries that it was 
nicknamed the " charnel house." The position in 
which the skeletons discovered lay, indicated that they 
had been buried. All these discoveries are supposed 
to form a cumulative argument that man inhabited 
Europe at a time when the cave-bear and the great 
feline species represented the great carnivorous animals, 
and the mammoth, the rhinoceros and the pachyderms. 
But — accepting as a starting point the one admissible 
distinction of the Stone Age — these animals belong 
to the palseoUthic period. Of course, it cannot be con- 
cluded with absolute certainty that primitive man 
lived on the earth with these animals, but the bone 
implements seem to suggest that men killed these 
animals for food. All the remains, it is quite clear, 
cannot be referred to this distant date. The age of the 
Canstadt skulls is still a bone of contention. Then, 
again, the bones, in many instance, have not the char- 
acteristics of great age. A more recent date is rendered 
highly probable, owing to volcanic agency, e. g., at Le 
Puy in the Department of Loire, and Calaveros in 
California, for these volcanoes were active in the fifth 
century of our era. Still, all this notwithstanding, we 
have to face the probability that man and beasts were 
contemporaries. 

And now another difficulty looms in sight: to 
determine the period at which the animals of the Lower 
Quaternary Epoch (diluvial) lived. It is all very well 
to invoke the aid of a higher temperature, to appeal 



MAN FROM THE SCIENTIFIC POINT OF VIEW. 1 85 

to the beginning of the Ice Age, and so forth; but these 
climatic conditions set up only a relative standard of 
measurement. Eminent geologists have declared with 
unmistakable emphasis, that man did not appear on the 
scene till after the Ice Age. The Ice Age and the 
Quaternary Epoch coincide in their beginnings, and 
man mu^t certainly be referred to the second glacial 
epoch. It has still to be ascertained whether there 
have been one or more Ice Ages. Now, historical 
proof is forthcoming that the temperature has been 
on the increase in many countries since the days of 
Herodotus, and that the glaciers generally have receded. 
Hence, there is no necessity to suppose that glacial 
man has been in existence for an immense number of 
years. When the fact is grasped, that within the last 
hundred years several species of animals have perished 
in Australia, and that the buffalo and the auerochs are 
even now on the point of dying out, it will be more 
clearly understood how, in an earlier age, when no 
quarter was given, sets of fauna were, owing to climatic 
action, completely swept away. 

I. NO TRACES OF TERTIARY MAN. 

So far the Tertiary Epoch has been sterile in fossil 
bones. Of no single bone that has been found can it 
be predicated with certainty that it is of the same age as 
the Tertiary deposits from which it was taken. Other 
footprints of Tertiary man have proved equally illusory. 
The Abbe Bourgois set the ball rolling by labeling the 
many flints he had found in Thenay (France) as the work- 
manship of Tertiary man. At first he succeeded in enlist- 
ing several men of science on his side; but the matter, on 



1 86 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

investigation, became so thickly enveloped in the mists 
of doubt that it vanished at last in utter improbability. 
The repeated works of art, with indented surfaces, are 
much like shapeless works of nature. Again, other 
flints, lances, arrowheads, spears and such like found 
in St. Prest, probably belong to a later formation. To 
determine the age of objects found in mud or sand 
deposits is most difficult, as these may easily have been 
buried subsequently at a greater depth. In Hke manner 
man's handiwork in conjunction with natural causes 
may have shifted the deposit. Moreover no standard 
is at hand for gauging the time of the deposits in the 
several periods. Recent researches, even in the much 
belauded Somme Valley, have shown that the layers 
of sand were formed in historic times. Furthermore 
it was alleged that drawings, which none but the hand 
of man can execute, adorned the bones of some Tertiary 
animals. Bones, too, have been produced which had 
been fractured, so it was said, by the hand of man. 
Colored impressions were also said to be distinctly 
perceptible on the bones of a petrified Hipparion 
recently discovered in Greece. How transparently 
fragile these reasonings are, he who runs may read. 
On inquiry it turns out that the holes and indentures 
were made by contemporary animals. Many of the 
alleged marks and drawings are accidental chinks 
wrought by mechanical causes. 

2. KITCHEN REFUSE. 

These remarks bear also on other remains of human 
life and industry found in the lower strata. Heaps of 
refuse, mussels, crabshells, bones, pots, and stone 



MAN FROM THE SCIENTIFIC POINT OF VIEW. 1 87 

implements have been found in every country and on 
every coast. The edible mussels, oysters, and snails 
cannot be a natural deposit, but are a heap of the refuse 
of man's meals, whence they were called kitchen refuse 
or kjokkenmoddings. This opinion is borne out also 
by the remains of ashes, coals and wood (beech, oak, 
phie) with which they are mingled, and by the fire 
places that have been discovered. But it is unsafe to 
assume that these were contemporary deposits, and 
unsafer still to compute their age. The deposits in the 
deltas proceed at a slow rate, but historical times can 
point to a great change. The configuration of lands 
and continents is other than it was. Elevations and 
depressions, upheavals and subsidences have likewise 
had their share in effecting the change. Alluvial de- 
posits, peat formations and stalagmites often attain a 
considerable thickness, but, as is well known, such 
formations are most irregular. The surroundings of 
the Quaternary Epoch were totally different from ours; 
the causes at work to transform the earth's surface 
throbbed with such fierce abnormal intensity, that their 
duration cannot be measured by their results. Com- 
pared with the thickness of the deposits, their duration 
must have been short. On this point geologists are 
agreed. So far the assumption of vast numbers of years 
lacks confirmatory evidence. 

With regard to the so-called '' lake dwellings " 
discovered in various parts of Europe, especially in 
Swizerland, they cannot be regarded as evidence of the 
great antiquity of the builders. For it has transpired 
that pile-builders dwelt near most lakes, even in historic 
times. 

In dealing with history and philology (see next 



1 88 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

chapter) no less than with geology, we must take care 
not to lose our heads over big figures. All apologists 
of note now agree in allowing that the antiquity of the 
human race is somewhat greater than it had been com- 
monly supposed. The lowest estimate varies between 
eight and ten thousand years, but even the highest is 
not double the Septuagint computation. 

And now we may safely leave the reader to draw 
his own conclusions in regard to both the essential 
dift'erence between man and the brute and his antiquity. 
As to the latter, we just come to see that man is not 
as old as some geologists and palaeontologists pretend. 
In regard to the former we have shown that man alone 
is self-conscious; he alone, unlike the whole of irra- 
tional nature, knows himself to be a personal being; 
he alone is conscious of moral obligations and responsi- 
bilities wdiich he often fulfills in opposition to his own 
nature and to the world around him. By being born 
with head erect he is destined to gaze upwards from the 
earth to heaven, to God his Creator. 



CHAPTER IX. 



CHRONOLOGT AND THE PRINCIPAL MONUMENTS. 
I. Biblical Chronology. 

THE Biblical chronology presents extreme dififi- 
culties. As far back as St. Jerome it was regarded 
as insoluble, although in his time and long after the 
objections which have been formulated against this 
chronology were not imagined. A learned religious 
of Citeaux, Father Perron, wrote in 1687: ''The 
antiquity of the epochs is much greater than is believed 
to-day. It is a great deviation from the truth to dis- 
regard the opinion of the Fathers and the ancient 
authors in regard to this subject. . . . All the 
Christians of the first centudies have counted about six 
thousand years until the arrival of the Messias. The 
history of the Chaldeans, Egyptians, and Chinese con- 
firm this chronology and cannot be made to agree with 
the Hebrew of to-day." 

The learned Father Touremine, S. J. said in this 
regard, in 1719: ''The Jewish calculation appeared to 
me always too short and little in accordance with cer- 
tain monuments of history. It takes from the chron- 
ologists several centuries necessary for the agreement 
of profane history with sacred history." 

The most of the chronologists down to this century, 
have confounded the epoch of the creation of the world 
with that of the creation of man, because they believed 

^ (189) 



190 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

that the one was separated from the other only by an 
interval of six days of twenty-four hours. Certain 
more perspicacious minds had, however, avoided this 
confusion. '' St. Gregory, of Nazianz, following St. Jus- 
tin the martyr, supposes," says Cardinal Wiseman, " an 
indefinite period between the creation and the first 
regular arrangement of things." 

All savants who have occupied themselves with the 
chronology of primitive times have taken for the basis 
of their inquiries the genealogical lists of the antedilu- 
vian and postdiluvian patriarchs contained in Genesis, 
and which extend, the one, from Adam to Noe, and the 
other, from Noe to Abraham (Gen. v. and xi). These 
are the only documents upon which it is possible to 
erect a calculation, because they are the only ones that 
have been preserved to us. Whence, therefore, the 
disagreement of the chronologists? Because the 
figures on which their calculations are founded are not 
the same in the original text, which has descended to 
us, on the one hand, through the Jews, and, on the 
other, through the Samaritans, as well as in the most 
ancient version of Genesis, that of the Septuagint. 

Now witness the totals of the antediluvian Hsts. 
The Hebrew and the Vulgate give 1656 years; the 
Greek, 2242; the .Samaritan, 1307. The postdiluvian 
lists, to the time of Abraham, give these totals: The 
Hebrew and the Vulgate, 307 years; the Greek, 1147; 
the Samaritan, 1017. Which gives, by adding the two 
lists since the creation of Adam to the time of Abraham: 
The Hebrew and the Vulgate, 2023 years; the Greek, 
3389; the Samaritan, 2329. Such are the usual figures; 
but in the case of the Septuagint, there exist numerous 
variations, resulting from the calculations of individual 



CHRONOLOGY AND PRINCIPAL MONUMENTS. 19I 

writers. It is thus that, in the first Hst, the total com- 
puted by JuHus Africanus is 2262, and that, in the post- 
diluvian Hst, Clement of Alexandria finds 1250 years 
to the time of Abraham. These two totals taken 
together would give, consequently, 3512 years from 
Adam to the time of Abraham. 

The savants not being able to agree among them- 
selves, the sacred text being uncertain on this point, 
the Church did she not, at least, express herself in 
regard" to this matter, and has she solved the difficulty? 
No! It is not within the province of the Church to 
regulate questions of chronology; she always left this 
subject to the historians with entire liberty to opine 
what conjectures and facts they might; she has not 
even manifested a marked preference in favor of any 
system. If the shortest chronology has predominated 
since the sixteenth century, it is not without notable 
exceptions, and the favor w^hich it has enjoyed was due 
to the authority attributed to the Protestant Scaliger 
in this character of inquiry. This savant having ex- 
pressed himself for the Hebrew text, to which the 
reformers attached in many things an exaggerated 
value, his opinion was generally accepted. 

The celebrated annalisf of the Church, Cardinal 
Baronius, while acknowledging the obscurity of the 
question, expressed himself in favor of the calculation 
of the Greek Bible, as more conformable to ecclesiastic 
tradition. All the doctors of the Greek Church, and 
all the ancient writers of the Latin Church have, indeed, 
accepted the figures w^hich the Septuagint give. The 
Roman Martyrology has always preserved them, and 
it assigns as date of the birth of our Lord '' the year 
5199 after the creation of the world." Some ancient 



192 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Fathers, including Julius Africanus, had recognized 
the impossibility of reconciHng the chronology of the 
Hebrew text with the history of the Chaldeans and 
Egyptians. 

In more modern times, the Jesuit missionaries in 
China declared themselves also in favor of the Septua- 
gint, by means of which they could reconcile the testi- 
mony of the annals of the country they evangelized 
with Holy Scripture, and their opinion was approved 
by their general. To eliminate all doubt. Father Adam 
Schall drew up, nevertheless, a memoir wherein he ren- 
dered account of the foundation of the Chinese chronol- 
ogy, and sent the same to Rome, where it was examined. 
It is not said whether or not the Holy Father was 
consulted, but a letter written from Rome, December 
20, 1657, in answer to the consultation, does not hesi- 
tate to affirm '^ that one can without scruple follow the 
Chinese chronology," placing the reign of the Emperor 
Yao in the year 2357 B. C, because it is not in contra- 
diction with the Septuagint, the chronology of which 
" is supported on the authority of the Fathers of the 
Church." 

What must we conclude from all these facts? 
First, that '' the Church does not warrant the exacti- 
tude of either of these two chronologies (of the Septu- 
agint and of the Hebrew text), and that her authority 
does not oblige us at all to follow rigorously the text 
transmitted by tradition, nor the sense which has been 
attributed to it down to the present." " Quam floxu 
facial illam numerorum varietatem testantur duo 
EeclesicB lumina, S. Hieronymus et S. AugustinuSy ' s>3iys 
Noel Alexandre ^ Hist. Eccles. Vet. Test." vol. i, p. 76). 
Moreover, it is impossible to fix the date of the creation 



CHRONOLOGY AND PRINCIPAL MONUMENTS. 1 93 

of man with, certitude; the more competent savants 
unanimously concede this. " The number of the years 
which elapsed since the creation to the Nativity of Christ 
is uncertain," says Pagi, the learned annotator of Bar- 
onius. . . . "' It will never be definitely ascertained 
what the age of the world was in the epoch of the Incar- 
nation." 

The reason of this avowed incertitude is, that in 
supposing the genealogical lists of Genesis to be com- 
plete, it is impossible to know the real figures written 
by Moses. It is even certain, because the list of the 
figures of the three most ancient and most respectable 
versions differ notably from one another, that two of 
these versions, as to the figures they give, are erroneous; 
consequently, it is not at all proved that any of the 
three versions gives actually the figures written by 
Moses. 

" The genealogies of the Bible, having for object to 
give us the filitation of early man, and not the succession 
of time, and, consequently, might have omitted interme- 
diaries," observes M. Wallon ('' La Sainte Bible resume," 
1867, vol. i, p. 435), " no calculation descends for 
certain beyond Abraham." What authorizes the sup- 
position of these omissions in Genesis, are the analogous 
omissions remarked in other books of the Scripture 
where it is possible for us to establish them. The latter 
have been acknowledged at all times, because they are 
evident. " It is possible," says Father Lequien, " that 
Moses considered it advisable to mention only ten 
principal patriarchs who preceded the Deluge, and ten 
others who followed it before Abraham, by omitting 
the others for reasons which are unknown to us, as 
St. Matthew has done in the genealogy of our Lord, 

D. B.— 13 



194 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

the author of Ruth, and that of the first book of the 
ParaHpomenons, in that of David and of the high 
priests. . . ." 

But the most remarkable example of breaks in the 
genealogical trees is that which Father Lequien first 
called attention to, that is, that which occurs in the 
Gospel of St. Matthew. The sacred author has ex- 
cluded, with evident object, from the list of the ances- 
tors of our Lord three well-known royal personages: 
Ochosias, Josias, and Amasias. But the suppression 
of generations means years, even centuries, which 
cannot be calculated in remote epochs. 

Consequently, the epoch of the appearance of man 
upon earth is altogether uncertain, not only because 
we are in ignorance of the exact figures which the 
author of the Pentateuch had written, but, moreover, 
because we are also totally unable to ascertain the num- 
ber of omissions in the genealogical series. When 
the alteration of figures can modify the estimate of the 
antiquity of man only in a limited manner, such is not 
the case where generations have been omitted, because 
it depends entirely upon how many these omissions were, 
and the periods of time which they represent, and thus 
how far back we may have to place the creation of man. 

Man is not as old as certain savants maintain; it has 
been determined, however, that he is of more ancient 
origin than has been generally believed. It is impossi- 
ble to uphold at present that the first man appeared 
upon earth only 4004 years, B. C, and to preserve that 
date which chronology derives from the Hebrew text. 
It is well established by geology and palaeontology that 
our species ascended from a very remote epoch. Cer- 
tain of these authorities have exaggerated this antiquity 



CHRONOLOGY AND PRINCIPAL MONUMENTS. 1 95 

on the basis of hypothetical calculations. The exist- 
ence of the Tertiary man is not proved at all, and he 
counts many more adversaries than adherents. Science 
is not conditioned to furnish us with precise figures in 
regard to the periods into which it has divided creation, 
much less is it enabled to assign the date of the appear- 
ance of man. 

'' What eminent geologists have written in regard 
to fossil man and his coexistence with preadamitic 
animals, etc., has to-day become without object," says 
Mr. Jakob, summing up the opinion of the savants on 
this subject. It is not regarded seriously in the present 
day at what date the glacial epoch took place, and how 
long it continued. The geologist knows no dates, 
but only a succession in the things; to the question of 
time, he must answer: " We do not know." It is thus 
that M. de Lapparent, whose name is an authority, 
concludes one of his most beautiful dissertations: " It 
is sufficient for us to have established how far all those 
calculations are lacking in a substantial foundation 
which distribute so generously hundreds and millions 
of centuries between the different phases of the Qua- 
ternary Epoch." 

It remains, nevertheless, not less true that, while 
rejecting these exaggerations, it must be admitted that 
man is much more ancient than was believed before 
the progress of geological research. The human races 
existed from a very remote antiquity; we find the prin- 
pal ones already pictured, such as they are to-day, on 
the most ancient monuments of Egypt. Humanity 
was, therefore, already very ancient in this epoch, 
because, issued from one single pair, it had time 
to become so greatly diversified. Philology furnishes 



196 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

an analogous conclusion; for in a very remote epoch 
we meet with a number of languages completely differ- 
ent from one another and as there could have been 
but one mother tongue, it required many centuries to 
have produced these different forms of speech. 

However, to appreciate the duration which these 
changes and revolutions have claimed in the languages 
and in the physical conformation of man, the chronome- 
ters are entirely wanting, and thus we can arrive only 
at vague and indefinite results. 

The historical monuments which have descended 
to us, and of which a great number have been dis- 
covered only in this century, will permit us to be a 
little more precise. We have already seen that it was 
the knowledge of the annals of China which obliged 
the Jesuit missionaries in this country, as well as several 
savants living in Europe in the seventeenth and eight- 
eenth centuries, to abandon the short chronology then 
in vogue, of the Hebrew text, and to return to that 
of the Septuagint, which had been followed before the 
adoption of the Hebrew. When the Sanscrit studies 
began to be cultivated in Europe, the Indianists claimed 
in their turn for India a high antiquity. But since the 
rise of the Egyptiology and Assyriology, the savants 
who devoted themselves to the deciphering of the 
hieroglyphics and the cuneiform characters have been 
still more exacting. Therefore, we will have to 
examine successively the chronology of India, China, 
Egypt and Chaldea. 

II. Chronology and the Principal Literary Monuments of Antiquity. 

I. In regard to India, its chronological pretensions 
are not justified. Those who occupy themselves with 



CHRONOLOGY AND PRINCIPAL MONUMENTS. 1 9/ 

Sanscrit studies acknowledge this themselves; they 
avow that their predecessors have exaggerated the 
antiquity of its history and literature. Those best 
versed in the literature of primitive India are the first 
to agree that it was completely void of historic weight. 
"' The Hindoos/' says Kruse, '' do not possess any work 
of history. They have wrapped up the ancient events 
in a poetic cloak of myths, without determination of 
time." 

It is generally supposed that the separation of the 
x\ryans and the Indo-European migrations, starting 
from Bactriana to disperse themselves to the four winds 
of heaven, took place anteriorly to the year 2500 B. C. 
This IS only a hypothesis, but it is quite probable. The 
antiquity which the Hindoos attribute to themselves 
is, therefore, fabulous. Talboys Wheeler commences 
their history only about 2500 years before the Christian 
era, and he has nothing to say about this epoch except 
of legends which he derives from the Mahabharata. 

M. Dunker asserts that one cannot with exactness 
go further back than the year 800 before the Christian 
era. 

The most ancient epigraphic monument of certain 
date, in which mention is made of the ancient Hindoos, 
is the thrilingual inscription of Darius, King of Persia, 
at Persepolis. The son of Hystaspes enumerates the 
land of the Hindush, the India, among the countries 
which are subject to his dominion. 

In the country itself no historic records, dated ante- 
rior to the third century before the Christian era, have 
been discovered. The inscriptions of x\coka (250 B. C), 
the most ancient of the native inscriptions, give some 
historic details of certain date. " The civilization and 



198 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

literature of India must be referred to a remote period 
in profane antiquity, there is really no doubt on the sub- 
ject . . . but nobody assigns to them that fabu- 
lous antiquity which was hastily attributed to them, 
because of a fame. . . . There is no Sanscrit work 
anterior to the body of the sacred writings, called 
Vedas. After a most scrupulous examination of the 
books, Indianists of eminent authority have not dared 
to set back the composition of the most ancient parts 
beyond the fourteenth century B. C. The learned 
editor of the Rigveda, Max Miiller, has traced with a 
master's hand the picture of the ancient Sanscrit litera- 
ture, and he has placed its complete development into 
a period of about one thousand years, of the twelfth 
to the second century before our era." (Cf. Barthol- 
emey Saint Hilaire, 1860-61, F. Neve, 1883.) 

According to Max Miiller, the ancient Hindoos did 
not originate the idea of a chronology; this idea came 
to them from elsewhere, like the alphabet and the use 
of money, and it was the influence of an association 
with the Greeks that led the Hindoos to date their 
historic documents. 

Therefore, the Sanscrit literature cannot furnish 
any imporant evidence of the antiquity of man, and we 
can conclude with Bartelemy Saint-Hilaire: " Ceylon 
alone, in the world of India, has regular annals and what 
might almost be called history. . . . Everywhere 
else history is absent altogether; or, when it tries to 
show itself, it is so disfigured that it is absolutely un- 
recognizable. . . . Since India did not wish to 
discard its dreams, one cannot historically invoke it 
from its tomb." 

2. Quite different in this respect from India, China 



CHRONOLOGY AND PRINCIPAL MONUMENTS. 1 99 

presents itself to us with a long series of regular 
annals. The Jesuit missionaries who first studied the 
Chinese chronology, were struck by the connection 
and unity which they remarked therein; the majority of 
the missionaries accepted the chronology without 
hesitation, and their testimony influenced several 
Sinalogues of Europe, who displayed a great avidity 
for this question in the seventeenth and eighteenth 
centuries. The Fathers Cibot and Premare conceived, 
nevertheless, doubt regarding the authenticity of the 
primitive dates contained in the Chinese histories, and 
they were followed by Guignes, Klaproth, Renaudot 
and some others. Even to the present day a diversity 
of opinion in regard to this subject exists. 

Father Martini commenced his history of China, 
published in 1658, with the reign of Fo-Hi, who 
inaugurated, according to the native savants, the period 
in 2952 B. C, which is designated as that of a '' very 
high antiquity." Father Gaubil who placed still farther 
back the reign of the Emperor Fo-Hi, '' to the body 
of the dragon, and to the head of the bull," was 
careful, however, not to fix any event before the 
Emperor Yao, whom he believes ascended the throne 
in 2357 B. C, according to the calculation of the eclipse 
mentioned in the annals of China. Only, he observes, 
China was at that time well populated, the people 
knew how to write in verse, fix the points of the sol- 
stices and of the equinoxes, manufacture articles of 
leather and of iron, weave the silk, etc. ..." And, 
necessarily, it must be admitted that there were people 
in China before the time of Yao." 

In spite of the reflections of the learned Jesuit, 
several modern Sinalogues have little faith in the 



200 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Chinese chronology; what renders very suspicious the 
Chinese dates and calculations is, that they rest upon 
no soHd basis, and that all means of control are wanting. 
The inhabitants of the Celestial Empire had not former- 
ly an era, properly speaking, like that of Nabonassar or 
of the Seleucides; the era of Hoanghti, commencing the 
year 2367 B. C, was adopted ofhcially by the Chinese 
government at a time when it was impossible to verify 
its exactitude; also it is not universally accepted by the 
natives themselves. " Who knows what occurred in 
remote antiquity," asks the Chinese Yangts, '' because 
no authentic document has descended to us? . . . 
In the primitive times historic documents were not 
preserved." Our modern authors cannot be more 
exacting than the Chinese authors. 

In 213 B.C., the Emperor Chi-Hoang-ti, founder of 
the dynasty of Tsin, commanded, under pain of death 
that all the historic books of the empire should be 
burned. The Chinese hterators have never questioned 
this annihilation of the documents of their ancient his- 
toric literature, and, if they are correct in this, all that is 
related in regard to times anterior to the dynasty of 
the Tsin, merits little confidence. However, modern 
critics cannot believe that a certain number of copies 
of the Chou-King and of other historic works did not 
escape the flames in an empire so vast as that of China. 

But a number of those even who admit as very 
probable that the destruction of the historic literature 
was not total, have another complaint to make against 
the Chinese chronology, namely; that the ancient 
monuments which would verify it are wanting. One 
of the most ancient historians of China, Siglsmond of 
Fries, divides his work into two parts: the mythic 



CHRONOLOGY AND PRINCIPAL MONUMENTS. 20I 

period and the historic period, the latter commencing 
in the year 775 B. C. Not, he says, that all events 
related after this date are historical, and that all those 
which precede it are fabulous, but " because this is 
the first fixed point for a comparative chronological 
study, whilst all the anterior dates can be considered 
only as estimation." What we do not meet with in 
China, neither do we find outside of this country; we 
have no other foreign testimony in favor of the great 
antiquity of the Chinese. For the commercial relations 
which we are assured existed, during three thousand 
years, between the Celestial Empire and Egypt, 
Chabas has proved that the monuments of ancient 
Egypt do not contain any mention of the Celestial 
Empire, although we recover therein all the other 
nations known at that time. 

3. The accounts we possess of the Egyptian chro- 
nology come to us from three different sources: from 
the narratives of the Greek travelers who had visited 
Egypt; from a history written in Greek by a native 
wTiter of great reputation, Manetho, shortly after the 
conquest of yVlexander, and, finally, from the original 
monuments, inscriptions, and papyri, recovered in the 
valley of the Nile since the beginning of this century. 

The Greek writers attribute to Egypt a very high 
antiquity. The priests of Heliopolis related to Solon 
that their monarchy ascended to 9,000 years. A 
century later, the priests of the same temple of Heli- 
opolis, told Herodotus that the annals of their kings 
ascended to 11,340 years, that is, 2,240 years more. 
According to Varro (116-126 years B. C), on the con- 
trary, the Egyptian monarchy had hardly existed, in 
his time, more than 2,000 years. Diodor of Sicily, 



202 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

who visited Egypt under the reign of Augustus, 
dates back the epoch of Menes to a period Httle 
anterior than 5,000 years before his time. But Httle 
satisfaction can be derived from these vague and 
contradictory accounts. The figures of the Greek 
travelers do not merit much confidence, and do not 
enjoy any great authority. They communicated with the 
Egyptians only through interpreters and besides, it is evi- 
dent, that the value of their testimony must be controled 
and appreciated with the help of native documents. 

Among the latter we possess only one which is 
anterior to the Egyptiological discoveries of our cen- 
tury, namely, the history of Manetho. 

Manetho, an Egyptian priest, born at Sebeunyt 
(now Semnoud) in the Delta, about the year 300 B. C, 
wrote in Greek a history of his country for his new 
masters, under the reign of Ptolemy Philadelpus. 
Unfortunately, the writing of Manetho was lost, but 
the chronological part has been preserved. He attrib- 
uted to Egypt an antiquity of 3,000 years before the 
epoch of Alexander. The reign of the gods occupies 
13,900 years, that of the heros 1,250, the reign of the 
other kings 1,817 years, of thirty Memphites 1,790, of 
ten Thinites 350 years, that of Menes and of the heros 
5,813, and, finally, the reign of thirty dynasties 5,000 
years. 

The most critics correctly consider as historical the 
thirty dynasties beginning with Menes and ending with 
Nectanebo II. The greatest embarrassment for the 
historian, is that the Hsts of Manetho enumerate the 
dynasties as if they had been successive, while it is, 
nevertheless, certain that there have been certain 
dynasties which were contemporaneous. Moreover, 



CHRONOLOGY AND PRINCIPAL MONUMENTS. 203 

Manetheo never associates, two kings on the throne. 
We know, however, through the monuments, that 
during certain periods, there were kings that jointly 
reigned in Egypt. The best known example is that of 
Ramses II of the nineteenth dynasty, who, when only 
twelve years of age, was associated on the throne by his 
father Seti, and reigned conjointly with him about 
20 years, after this he continued to reign about 36 
years. Manetho assigns to these two kings a reign 
of loi years; the monuments attribute "jy years. 
Finally, the historian of Egypt exaggerates frequently 
the duration of the reign of his kings. In thirty-seven 
cases where we can control his figures by those of the 
papyrus of Turin, they exceed the latter twenty-two 
times, and are deficient only six tiiries. The total of 
these thirty-seven reigns is, according to Manetho, 
984 years, and, according to the papyrus of Turin, 615 
years; there is, therefore, an excess of more than one- 
third (Cf. G. Rawlinson, '' The Antiquity of Man "). 
The authority of Manetho, even in the thirty dynasties, 
needs therefore, to be regulated by the monuments. 

The authentic and original monuments of the 
Egyptian chronology are the royal lists, the most 
important is that which is contained in the papyrus of 
Turin. Unfortunately, the papyrus, entire at the 
time of its recovery, was broken when they trans- 
ported it to Turin, and is not now complete. The 
Egyptians had no era; they had not, consequently, 
a chronological system. The accounts which are 
preserved to us state how long each king reigned, but 
do not connectedly determine when one king begins 
to reign at the time when the reign of another termi- 
nated, The only effort of chronology existing to-day 



204 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

is in a stela of Tanis, where there is mention of the year 
400, but this is an isolated fact, besides even now but 
poorly understood. (Cf. Mariette, La Stele de 
Van 400, in the '' Revue Archeologique," 1865, vol. xi, 
p. 169-190.) 

When the shortest chronologies are doubtful and 
suspicious, the longest are certainly false; even their 
authors themselves have been cautious to assert their 
truthfulness. '' In the actual state of things," says 
Brugsch, *' no living man is capable of removing the 
difficulties which prevent the restoration of the original 
list of kings contained in the fragments of the Turin 
papyrus. ... It appears certain, besides, that 
the long duration of kings which the papyrus formerly 
contained, had been arranged by the author according 
to his own ideas and individual views." The preceding 
paragraph explains why there exists such a great discord 
among the different modern historians who have 
occupied themselves with the history of Egypt. It 
is, therefore, with Egypt, to a certain degree, as with 
China: the historic monuments and the dates they 
furnish are insuf^cient to establish an exact chronology, 
and of themselves, they do not prove that the chro- 
nology of the Septuagint is not of sufficient antiquity. 

4. Chaldea and Assyria offer more precise figures 
than Egypt. They are furnished to us not through 
the ancient authors, but through the native monuments 
discovered in the last years. We possess no other 
ancient native accounts of these countries except those 
which are contained in the Chaldean history of Berosus, 
priest of Bel, at Babylon, in the time of Antiochus II, 
King of Syria (261-246 B.C.); but what fragments which 
have arrived to us from him teach in regard to chro- 



CHRONOLOGY AND PRINCIPAL MONUMENTS. 205 

nology is, in great part, fabulous, and has not met with 
credence, even among the Greeks and Romans. Accord- 
ing to Berosus, there had elapsed 36,000 years since the 
Deluge until the Persian conquest. 

The Babylonians alleged also, in favor of their an- 
tiquity, their astronomical observations which they 
made descend beyond 45,000 years. But this allegation 
thenus to study the Chaldean astronomy, after the 
Greeks. When Aristotle charged his disciple Callis- 
thenus to study the Chaldean astronomy, after the 
taking of Babylon by Alexander, this savant stated that 
his observations embraced only a period of 1,903 years. 
The ancient authors teach us nothing more than Bero- 
sus about the Chaldean antiquity, and, until the second 
half of the nineteeenth century, no further knowledge 
was obtained ; but the Assyriological discoveries of the 
last century have totally changed the order of things. 

The cuneiform documents have furnished us, indeed, 
new accounts of the Babylonian chronology, and it is 
especially through the , Assyrians that they have been 
furnished. The Assyrians are the first people of an- 
tiquity among whom we discover some chronology. 
The historic inscriptions which they have left us, and 
which the contemporary explorers have excavated from 
the ruins of their ancient capitals, contain the most 
precise details, and are carefully dated. This people 
did not count like the Egyptians and the Chinese, by 
the years of reign of their sovereigns, but by the name 
of eponym officers, called Limmi, who gave their name 
to the year, Hke the Archonts at Athens, and the Con- 
suls at Rome. They drew up canons or eponymous 
lists, and some of these documents have been recovered 
and published. Unfortunately, we possess only a very 



206 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

small portion of them. The fragments recovered give 
us an exact chronology of the history of the Assyrian 
Empire, from 913 to 659 B. C, but we have the assur- 
ance that the institution of the Limmi descended at 
least to the fourteenth century before our era, for the 
inscription of Binnirar I is dated by the eponymy of 
Salmankarradu. Thanks to this system of chronology, 
the Assyrians were enabled to give precise dates for 
past events, an exactitude, which, in a similar respect, 
is not met with among any other people. Sennacherib 
(705-681), the enemy of Ezechias, mentions in one of 
his inscriptions that a seal having belonged to Tuklath- 
Ninip, had been carried to Babylon 600 years previously 
and that 418 years had elapsed when he himself invaded 
Babylon (692), since the defeat of Teglath-Phalasar I 
(about 1 1 30) by the Babylonians. Teglath-Phalasar I 
says, in his turn, that he restored at Khalah-Chergat 
(the antique city of Assur) a temple built by Samsibin, 
son of Ismidagon, 701 years before. 

The son of Sennacherib, Assurbanipal (668-626), 
relates on his part, that an idol which he recovered in 
639 in the country of Elam, had been forcibly carried 
away from Erech, that it was then 1,635 years, conse- 
quently 274 years before our era. This is the most 
remote date which the Assyrian documents have as yet 
furnished. We may, however, entertain some doubt 
regarding the veracity of the last figures. The carrying 
away of the idol of the goddess Nana, being an event 
in the history of Chaldea, we have not in favor of its 
date the same guarantees as for the facts which regard 
Assyria. 

M. Pinches, in 1882, made known to the Biblical 
Archaeological Society of London, a cylinder of Na- 



CHRONOLOGY AND PRINCIPAL MONUMENTS. 20/ 

bonidus, King of Babylon, found at Abou-Abba, and 
preserved now in the British Museum. We read 
thereon that Ligbagas or Urbagas, King of Ur, hved 
700 years before the epoch of Hammuragas, the 
time of which is, however, unknown. But we read 
thereon, moreover, that Naramsin, son of Sargon I, 
had founded the temple of the god Samas (the sun) at 
Sippara, 3,200 years before the reign of Nabonidus, 
that is, about the year 3750 before our era. This 
positive date would set back the Deluge, known to 
the Babylonians as well as to the Hebrews, to more 
than 4000 years B.C.; for, before Naramsin and before 
Sargon, there had been already, according to the testi- 
mon}^ of the monuments, a certain number of kings 
posterior to the great cataclysm. 

However, we must remark, that although the date 
given by Nabonidus has been vigorously maintained 
by certain Assyriologists, it should only be accepted 
reservedly. Indeed, nothing vouches for the exacti- 
tude of this calculation of so remote an antiquity as 
made by the King Nabonidus, or those who furnished 
him this date in regard to an epoch greatly removed 
from them, and we must also remark that, until a recent 
date, no trace of a chronological canon, similar to that 
of the Assyrians, was met with among the Babylonians. 
How, therefore, could Nabonidus calculate to a cer- 
tainty, the time which separated him from Naramsin? 
May not the priests of Sippara have exaggerated the 
antiquity of their temple, and may not the figures of 
the inscription be fabulous, or extended beyond the 
warrant of truth, like so many others we read of in 
Berosus? 

An exact chronology of Chaldea and Babylonia 



208 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

commences only with the era of Narbonassar in 747 
B. C, but all means of verification are wanting for the 
anterior epochs, except in the Assyrian monuments, 
which do not go back far enough. 

5. In conclusion, the history of India, and even that 
of China, in their authentic portions, can be inclosed 
without very great difficulty in the centuries admitted 
by the Greek and Latin Fathers. As to Egypt, the 
high antiquity of Menes is far from being proved, and 
numerous reasons tend to lower its date; finally, the 
ancient civilization of Egypt and Chaldea ofifers no 
basis for an exact calculation, and we may, at least, give 
this advice to the archaeologues and savants: Establish 
on good proofs the antiquity of man and of the ancient 
peoples and the Bible will not contradict you. It pre- 
sents no obstacle to the path of these researches, pro- 
vided one remains within the limit of a wise criticism. 
Suffice it to say that all knowledge obtainable on this 
subject can but verify the revealed truth of Him, " Who 
hath numbered the sand of the sea, and the drops of 
rain, and the days of the world." 



CHAPTER X. 



UNITT OF MANKIND. 

i-'T^HE whole human race, accordmg to Holy Scripture, 
1 is descended from one physically united pair, 
Adam and Eve. Preadamites are impossible. Apart 
from Adam there has been no race. An exegetical 
difficulty arises out of Genesis iv, 14-16; but it affords 
as httle ground as Romans v, 14, for Isaac Pereyre's 
contention, that Genesis represents Adam as the pro- 
genitor of none but the Jewish race. The Old and 
New Testaments repeatedly proclaim that the human 
race is one, in the strict sense of the word (Acts xvii, 
26; Heb. ii, 11). The doctrines of original sin and 
redemption are based on this community of descent. 
By one man sin and death, and by one man grace and 
life have come into the world. This intimate connec- 
tion between unity of race and the dogma of redemp- 
tion prompted Augustine, Lactantius and others to 
deny the existence of the antipodes. 

2. Science, too, has been compelled to acknowledge 
this common humanity. The discovery of America 
unexpectedly brought to light a new race. The learned 
were as much perplexed as Pliny of old, when he set 
eyes on the black Ethiopians. Their convictions were 
shaken. NaturaHsts and missionaries assigned the 
Redskins to another Adam, or denied that they were 
D. B.— 14 (209) 



2IO DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

created by God. Pope Paul III had to issue a Brief 
asserting that the Indians had equal rights with other 
men. Later on, selfish slave-traders, egged on by the 
learned, tried to widen to the uttermost the rift between 
whites and blacks, by declaring dominion and slavery 
to be their respective birthrights. This, however, not- 
withstanding proofs of the common origin of all races 
are now coming in thick and fast. The Darwinians, 
in direct antagonism to their own principles, obstinately 
maintained the stabiHty of the various races. But, 
despite all obstructions, modern naturalists have 
marched forward towards the goal of unity. Polyg- 
enists are fast sinking into disrepute, and the unity of 
the species is coming to be recognized. Philologists 
have likewise grown in prudence and discretion. The 
physical and spiritual differences existing between men 
still present many difficulties*; there is, however, no 
danger to faith as long as a common origin is allowed 
to be possible. 

3. However much people differ in size and color and 
hairiness, in the skeleton, the formation of the skull and 
so forth, still common characteristics are at hand that 
unite the several groups into races. The very name 
of race indicates the meaning of the principle of division. 
For it was chosen on the supposition that all races form 
one species. The fact that all races cross and are fertile, 
affords one among several verifications of this supposi- 
tion. Cross breeds are often more fertile than alliances 
in the same race. As long as this common charac- 
teristic holds good, the unity of the human species 
is a necessary consequence. Clearly, therefore, the 
differences of race are not essential nor absolutely 
unchangeable. The characteristics of each race are 



UNITY OF MANKIND. 2 I I 

found in isolated and exceptional instances in other 
races. Differences of race are as old as history, yet no 
classification has been generally accepted. The bulk 
of the population of Central Africa are generally desig- 
nated as Negroes, and it is usual to characterize the 
negro type by black, woolly hair, prominent cheek bones, 
pouting lips, and black skin. Later researches, how- 
ever, have show^i that this type exists in only a few 
of the wild stocks on the slave coast. At length these 
characteristics get so toned down, that this race forms 
a transition to the inhabitants of Melanesia and the 
other islands. The same is true of the Mongolians. It 
would seem, therefore, that race differences were not 
formed till the tribes had migrated and settled, and that 
they now remain constant unless interfered with from 
without. Once the type has set firm through hundreds 
and thousands of years, individuals easily lose all capac- 
ity for variation. Even change of abode and of climate 
is unable to revive it. 

Nevertheless, the experience gained in America 
during three hundred years has shown that the color 
and facial expression of negroes are undergoing a slow 
change. And the change w^ould have been still more 
marked, had not slaves been constantly imported from 
Africa. It is very striking in those who have mixed 
with other races. 

4. Race is the gradual outcome of the mutual action 
and reaction of people and country on each other. In 
nothing is this brought out so clearly as in color. 
Color is not merely external. Its foundation lies deep 
down in organism. It supposes a greater change than 
is usually ascribed to the power of the sun. Color is 
caused by the carbon pigment found in the Malpighian 



212 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

cells. These cells are also found in the colored places 
of the white man's skin. The sun cannot suddenly 
effect this transformation, but may further it in the 
course of time. A change in the color of the skin may 
have easily been caused by the sun acting in conjunction 
with moisture, temperature, manner of living, and other 
climatic factors. The physiological explanation is that 
respiration, being retarded by heat, fails to change all the 
carbon into carbonic acid. The light playing on the 
surface materially aids the process. Parts not exposed, 
like the sole of the foot and the palm of the hand, are 
less dark even in the negro. Arabian women, who go 
about well wrapped up, are as white as Europeans. 
Even in the same country and climate this influence 
acts in different degrees, although the skins are gener- 
ally darkest in hot countries. Anyhow, side by side 
with secondary and accidental causes, light and climate 
will always be regarded as the chief factors in producing 
the change. 

5. Other differences, in the skeleton and formation 
of the skull for example, are less important. Occu- 
pation and manner of living, and malformations, 
intentional or otherwise, may have had their share in 
producing a clear but variable type in a short time. Any- 
how, such deviations in the animal world do not hinder 
the various races from forming one species. In man 
the difficulty is even less. For as the races are generally 
fertile, intermediate forms are everywhere possible, and 
these act as links and transmission agents. Blumen- 
bach has pointed out that transitional forms grow more 
and more numerous. Humboldt considers that the 
many intermediate stages in skull formation, and in 
the color of the skin, are a strong plea for unity. The 



UNITY OF MANKIND. 2x3 

transition of races is made still clearer by modern re- 
searches. The American stock is the connecting link 
between the Caucasian and the Mongolian; the Malay 
bridges over the Caucasian and the Negro. 

6. Nor, again, is the distinction into higher and 
lower races justified by anatomy. The Caucasian has 
no claim to the highest place, for other races are equally 
complete, not to say adapted to their environment. 
The Negro can endure heat and cold, and withstand 
fatigue better than the Caucasian and American. And 
in this respect the Malay, climate notwithstanding, is 
superior to the European. In intellect, however, the 
case is altered. No one denies that the very lowest 
races are still human. But there is a widespread opin- 
ion that some races are, and have been, low, and will 
never rise. Darwin could hardly believe that the 
inhabitants of Terra del Fuego were men. Similar stories 
are told of AustraUans and Polynesians, and in the 
case of the Negroes have passed current as an axiom. 
Intellectual inferiority is regarded as a specific charac- 
teristic of the Negro race, especially of those stocks that 
are the typical representatives of the race. It is likewise 
pretended that the ape approximates to man in the 
formation of the brain. With the physical differences 
we have already dealt, but speech and reason clearly 
demonstrate that the intellectual difference between 
the ape and the Negro is specific; whereas there is a 
difference of degree only between the Negro and other 
races. The intellectual inferiority of the Negro and 
savage tribes has been grossly exaggerated. Even 
Darwin was subsequently obliged to reconsider his ver- 
dict on the people of Terra del Fuego. Owing to the 
praiseworthy eft'orts of missionaries notable results have 



214 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

already been achieved. This proves that they possess 
a great capacity for education. The Indians often dis- 
play great shrewdness and intelligence. Thanks to 
Jesuit influence, a new and able nation has sprung up 
in Paraguay, Colorado, and elsewhere. Negro children 
educated in America and Europe learn easily. All tribes 
are susceptible of education and culture; all are possessed 
with a greater or less intelligence. The animals, es- 
pecially those of the superior species, are not wanting 
in a certain (animal) intelligence and memory, but all of 
them are devoid of reason, while there is not a single 
human race which has not the faculty of reasoning, ab- 
stracting and generalizing. 

7. All men, even the most savage, are social. It is 
a long time since Aristotle defined man as a " political 
animal," that is, a social animal. Certain animal species 
are also social, especially the bees and the ants; but their 
organization is not the work of reason; it is not supple 
and flexible like ours; it has not the family as basis, and 
cannot accommodate itself to circumstances of time and 
place. Human association has the same end every- 
where — security and mutual assistance, founded in 
part on the ties of friendship, in part on community 
of interests. It secures to the individual the means of 
existence, and special advantages which he could not 
possess in a state of isolation. 

8. All human races are endowed with the gift of 
speech. From the comparative study of languages, 
we learn of developments that had taken place before 
history had dawned. Languages are in fact as numer- 
ous as independent peoples, and history tells us that 
language and customs were the great barrier that sepa- 
rated tribe from tribe. Some people have, indeed, 



UNITY OF MANKIND. 215 

changed their language. One original language may 
not be an absolutely certain proof that the human race 
IS one. Still, language is a sure-footed guide, and the 
original language is at least a negative proof, and affords 
a strong positive presumption in favor of unity. 
Whence comes it that languages differ? This question, 
though scarcely ever broached formerly, seems now to 
be coming to the front. Outside the Old Testament 
there is scarcely a record of any nation busying itself 
with the problem why languages should be many 
instead of one. The Indians of Central America, how- 
ever, have a saying very much like the words of Scrip- 
ture, that all men had one speech and one religion, but 
that when the town of Tulan worshipped false gods their 
speech was changed. 

9. '' Though languages," says Humboldt, '' may at 
first sight appear very different, though their notions 
humors, peculiarities, may seem singular, nevertheless, 
they betray a certain analogy, and we shall understand 
their numerous relations better according as the philo- 
logical history of nations, and the study of language 
become more perfect." The last twenty years have 
proved the correctness of this view to a great extent. 
The Mosaic account represents nations as related whose 
relationship antiquity was unable to recognize. The 
Romans and Greeks, in spite of their culture, never 
dreamed that they were nearer related to the Aryans 
and Germans than the Syrians and Tyrians. What 
Holy W>it had stated the science of the nineteenth 
century has confirmed: lonians, Aryans, and Germans 
are of common origin. The study of language has 
proved that before the ancestors of the Hindoos and 
Persians emigrated toward the south, and before the 



2l6 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Greek, Roman, Celtic, Teutonic, and Slav colonies went 
to Europe, there was probably on the plains of Asia a 
tribe of Aryans who spoke a language, which was not 
Sanscrit, nor Greek, nor German, but which called the 
Giver of light and life by the same name which to-day 
may be heard in the temples of Benares, in the basilicas 
of Rome and in the cathedrals and churches of northern 
Germany. " All the Indo-Germanic languages," says 
Pott, " were identical before the separation; they exist 
in the germ in one original language, which disappeared 
when they were differentiated from it." 

lo. In conclusion, we can hold that the Mosaic ac- 
count, which tells us that the division of languages took 
place a long time after the creation, and brings this 
division into immediate connection with the division 
of mankind into different nations at the building of 
the Tower of Babel, appears to be confirmed by the 
results of the science of language. 



CHAPTER XI. 



TUB EARTHLT PARADISE AND ITS SITE. 

OUR first parents were placed in a garden of pleas- 
ure, which we call " Earthly Paradise." Moses 
names the country where it was situated and calls it 
Eden (Gen. ii, 8; iv, 6), and the Paradise itself, in the 
Hebrew Bible is called Eden,, i. e. joy or delight. We 
recover our word Paradise in the Hebrew under the 
form of pardes (Cant, iv, 13), Yw\^2iic, paradisus ; Eccl. 
ii, 5. Vulgate, poinaria ; 2 Esd. ii, 8, Vulgate, saltus) 



THE EARTHLY PARADISE AND ITS SITE. 21/ 

to signify like in the ancient Persian (pairadueza) 
" park," garden planted with trees, enclosed. 

The Sacred Text determines the situation of Paradise 
by stating that Eden was in the Orient, according to 
the original text (Gen. ii, 8), and that a river which 
flowed through the garden, divided afterwards into four 
streams, capita, called Phison, Gehon, Tigris, and Eu- 
phrates. The identification of the Tigris and the 
Euphrates offers no difficulty; these are the rivers 
which have been always known under these names; on 
the contrary, the identification of the Phison and of the 
Gehon is still undetermined. It is said of the Gehon 
that it flows around the land of Cush, which latter place, 
as translated by the Septuagint and the Vulgate, signi- 
fies Ethiopia, because Ethiopia has been inhabited, after 
the dispersion of the nations, by the Cushites; but the 
latter lived previously in Asia, and Cush designates 
here certainly a country of Asia. 

The most of the commentators, down to the present 
day, have believed that the earthly paradise was situated 
in Occidental Asia. Some place Eden into Armenia, 
others near the Persian Gulf below the confluence 
of the Euphrates and the Tigris, where these two 
rivers form the Schat-el-Arab. A certain number of 
modern savants believe, on the contrary, that we must 
seek it in India or on the plateau of Pamir. According 
to them, Hevilath, the country which Is watered by 
the Phison, and where gold, bdellium and onyx are 
found, is India, which was known to the ancient Jews as 
a country extending indefinitely towards the southeast. 
This explanation is not reconcilable with the Biblical 
text. 

The Deluge and other disturbances which have 



2l8 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

overthrown certain parts of the earth, may have modi- 
fied notably the topography of the place where Paradise 
was situated, and thus rendered insolvable the question 
of its site. The opinion which seems the most proba- 
ble is that which places it into Armenia, in the rich 
valleys of which still exists a territory as fertile as any 
in the world. The Euphrates and Tigris have their 
sources in this region ; the Tigris rises about three miles 
from the Euphrates, in the north of Diarbekir. It is 
hereabouts that the first man was placed on earth. The 
Phison is either the Phase of the classical authors, which 
flows from east to west, and empties into the Black Sea, 
or the Kur, the Cyrus of the ancients, which has its 
source in the neighborhood of Kars, not far from the 
occidental source of the Euphrates, and thus empties 
into the Caspian Sea, after having mingled its waters 
with those of the Arax. Hevilath, watered by the 
Phison, is the Colchis, the country of precious metals, 
whither the i\rgonauts went to seek the Golden Fleece. 
As to the Gehon, it is the Aras of to-day, the ancient 
Arax, called by the Arabs Djaichoum (or Gehon) er 
Ras, which proceeds from the neighborhood of the 
occidental source of the Euphrates, and empties, as we 
have said, together with the Kur, into the Caspian Sea. 
The land of Cush which it crosses, according to Genesis, 
is the country of the Kosseans, Cassiotis, regio Cossce- 
orum. " That the Eden . . . must be sought in 
the sources of the Euphrates and Tigris," says a learned 
German philologue, M. Ebers, '' appears to us beyond 
all question; this is established by ethnography and 
geography, by the Hebrew history and the Armenian 
chronicles, and, in our days, by a particular authority, 
the compared philology." 



THE EARTHLY PARADISE AND ITS SITE. 219 

The traditions of the earthly Paradise have been 
preserved among a great number of nations. Several 
of them locate the cradle of humanity among the high 
mountains of Central Asia, where the great Asiatic 
rivers have their sources. According to the Hindoos, 
the four or five great rivers arose to the north of the 
sacred mountain, the Merou (Himalaya) or Pamir, to 
direct themselves towards different points of the world. 
The ancient Iranians placed it in the north, on Mount 
Hukairya, one of the peaks of the sacred mountain 
Hara-Bserezaiti, called also Albordj, whose summits 
reached until heaven, to the revivifying waters of Ardvi- 
Cura, which had its source in heaven itself, thus obtain- 
ing the power to fructify the earth. The Chinese 
describe the cradle of mankind thus: '' It is a mountain 
situated in the middle of the central plateau of Asia, 
forming part of the chain of Kuen-Lun. In the midst 
of the mountain, there is a garden where a tender zephyr 
breathes constantly and moves the leaves of the beauti- 
ful Tong. This delightful garden is situated at the 
gates close to heaven. The waters which furrow it 
proceed from a fruitful yellow source, called the source 
of immortality; those who drink thereof do not die. It 
divides itself into four rivers flowing towards the north- 
west, the southwest, the southeast and the northeast. 
(Cf. Liiken, '' UberUeferungen," vol. i, p. 100.) 



CHAPTER XII. 



THE CREATION OF EVE. 

ACCORDING to the Rationalists the history of the 
creation of Eve is a fable, improbable and impossi- 
ble. To this we answer that there is no absolute 
impossibility and improbabiUty here. Certainly God 
could do all that is related in the Sacred Text (Gen. ii). 
He could form the first woman out of the rib of Adam. 
That those who pretend not to believe in the existence 
of God, refuse to believe this truth, we can very easily 
understand, but one must know that they reject this 
truth because they are atheists or deists, and all 
that we have to prove against them is that God could 
act as He pleased, that He could create the first woman 
as indicated in Holy Scripture. 

In the very nature of the thing itself, the creation. 
and early existence of mankind must have been replete 
with extraordinary events; nearly everything in that 
time had to be produced, not as now in the natural 
order, but by means of a supernatural agency. Eve 
could not have a mother, hence she had to be born in 
an extraordinary manner. And why could the Creator 
not form her, in order to give us the grand lessons 
derived from her creation, in the manner related by 
Genesis? 
(220) 



THE CREATION OF EVE. 221 

The Church has not condemned the commentators 
who have refused to accept hterally the BibHcal narra- 
tive of the creation of the first woman. She has not 
censured the opinion of Origen and Cardinal Cajetan, 
who have explained in an allegorical sense the formation 
of Eve out of a rib of Adam; but, irrespective of very 
rare exceptions, the Fathers and Doctors accepted 
literally the Biblical statement, and in this they were 
right. It is not the supernatural character of the 
account that should here prevent an incredible feature. 
The creation of the first woman was necessarily miracu- 
lous and supernatural. 

Why did God select that mode of creation which 
the sacred author reports rather than another? Were we 
unable to explain this, we could conclude nothing from 
our ignorance against the fact itself, but the reason 
is evident and palpable, so to say, as Lacordaire has very 
well demonstrated. *' The creation of Eve," he says, 
*' gives plurality to man without destroying his oneness. 
Taking as a standard of human society the eternal 
order of divine society, God knew that there would be 
no moral unity in the relations of man to man; there- 
fore. He wished that these relations should take their 
source in a substantial unity, imitating as much as 
possible the tie which keeps together the three un- 
created divine • persons in an inefifable perfection. 
Humanity should be united by nature, by origin, by 
blood, and form in all its members, by means of this 
triple unity, only one soul and one body. This plan 
was conformable to the general ends of God, which were 
to create us after His image and likeness, in order to 
communicate His goods to us all. This was worthy 
of His wisdom and goodness, and when we remember 



222 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

that an impious infidel can scoff and ridicule this mag- 
nificently divine conception, we can feel only the greatest 
pity for such a man who considers his intelligence 
greater than that of his Maker." (Conferences de Notre 
Dame, no. 51, Paris 1848.) 



CHAPTER XIII. 



THE FALL AND ORIGINAL SIN. 

WITH regard to the history of the temptation and 
of the Fall, as related in Genesis (iii). we 
must not be astonished when we find therein wonderful 
particulars. 

Man, according to the first design of the Creator, 
should not have that unfortunate inner inclination 
towards evil which is our sad inheritance. And, never- 
theless, God having created him free, wished to try his 
fidelity. How could He do this, since neither Adam 
nor Eve felt the sting of concupiscence? Only by per- 
mitting a foreign agent to tempt them. But how 
could the devil, who is a pure spirit, tempt them, if not 
clothing himself with a sensible form, or by making use 
of a corporeal body? And how, finally, could God try 
the fidelity of his free and reasonable creature in a more 
natural and logical manner, than by requiring an ex- 
terior act of obedience, easy in itself, consisting in not 
eating of a forbidden fruit, which the obedience due 
to the Creator should have restrained them from tast- 
ing, but which all the human passions, aroused by the 



THE FALL AND ORIGINAL SIN. 223 

tempter, pride, sensuality, curiosity, the spirit of inde- 
pendence caused the fall of both the man and the 
woman ? 

Hence, Catholic doctrine has not been unreasonable 
by taking, in the literal sense, the account of Genesis. 
With reason it has beheved that, because what precedes 
and follows this account is historical, and not mytho- 
logical, there was no good ground to beHeve that the 
account itself is a myth, but the pure and simple expres- 
sion of truth. 

One can say that the most ancient traditions of 
humanity justify the general interpretation of the 
Church, for the most ancient nations have preserved 
the tradition of a primitive golden age and of the first 
sin, which is but a remembrance of the Eden of Genesis. 
This remembrance is undoubtedly more or less vague, 
but on this account it is not less worthy to draw our 
attention. The Assyrian monuments, discovered at 
modern times, frequently represent to us a deity wrest- 
ling with a dragon, and the seduction of the first men 
often appears attributed to the dragon Tihamat. The 
role of the serpent itself is not unknown in the primitive 
traditions. 

The infidels object, it is true, that all the primitive 
traditions of some peoples, are allegorical and mytho- 
logical, and that the Hebrew people cannot form an 
exception to the general rule, but we ask: Why not? 
Because all the rehgions claim to be true, does it follow 
from this that they are all false, without exception? We 
maintain expressly that the Bible is not a book like the 
other books, just as the Christian religion is not a 
religion like the other religions. We believe that Gen- 
esis alone gives us the explanation of the real origin 



224 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

of evil Upon earth, whilst all other explanations, con- 
ceived with great pains by the philosophers or invented 
spontaneously by the popular imagination, explain 
nothing. 

Another accusation against Genesis is that it 
wounds the moral feeling in making us responsible for 
a fault which we have not personally committed. Cer- 
tainly, we have to admit that, at first sight, there is 
something mysterious and terrible in this solidarity 
which renders us partially responsible, after so many 
past generations, for a fault which we have not com- 
mitted. But the enemies of the Church, when they 
attack this wonderful chapter of Genesis which teaches 
us more about man and humanity than all the philoso- 
phers together, do not pay attention to the fact that 
Moses proclaims an incontestable truth, the law of soli- 
darity, one of the greatest laws which govern the world. 

The heavenly bodies attract and move themselves 
reciprocally according to the laws of universal gravita- 
tion. Men are neither independent nor isolate; they 
exercise naturally one upon another an efficacious 
inlluence, either for good or for evil. The entire uni- 
verse is like a great organism, where everything is held 
connected and enchained, and just like every individual 
feels pain when one of his parts is attacked, so also a 
local disorder can engender a general disturbance, which 
often extends beyond the place where it took rise. 

Hence, it is not only in this particular of original 
sin, but in a multitude of occasions and circumstances 
that we play an unpleasant part in the great scheme 
of the universe, and that the Creator makes us carry the 
weight of the sins of our fathers. We enjoy the fruits 
of their virtues, but we also suffer from their faults and 



THE FALL AND ORIGINAL SIN. 225 

vices. The parents transmit to their children their 
health or their diseases, sometimes something of their 
good or evil moral dispositions. The voice of the past 
has in the history of nations a continuous echo. In the 
family the glory and the honor are an inheritance like 
property and riches, and the infamy of a parent im- 
presses itself like a stigma of shame upon the forehead 
of the children. In society, the prosperity of all depends 
upon the government of one or a few; good or bad laws 
made by a few men, or even by a single man, save or 
destroy the people; the" faults of the chiefs result again 
in calamities to those whom they lead, and whole 
nations groan during centuries under the weight of 
ancient crimes. A victory or a defeat can effect for 
generations the fate of a nation. Those brilliant popu- 
lations of Asia Minor, which were shining so brightly 
at the beginning of our era, have seen their civiHzation 
eclipsed, because they were wanting in power to resist 
the Crescent, and their degenerate descendants are 
to-day the shadow of what they formerly were. If 
Charles Martel had not crushed, in the fields of Poitiers, 
the Arabs of Spain, what would have become of the 
European nations? Would the Moslem invasion not 
have dried up in its source that great river of civiliza- 
tion which has since penetrated into the very heart of 
Europe, and nourished into being the magnificence of 
the continent. 

Such is the law of solidarity, general and universal, 
which is limited neither by time nor by space, which 
applies itself to man, to the family, to society; which 
renders in a certain measure the children responsible 
for the faults of their fathers, the subjects responsible 
for the faults of their kings and rulers. Both are heirs 

D. B.-15 



226 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

of the merits and of the virtues of their ancestors, and of 
those who have governed them; it explains in part the 
degeneration as well as the ennobling of the races, the 
prosperity and the power of the nations, as well as their 
weaknesses and misfortunes. 

With these principles, original sin explains itself. 
It is the consequence of the soUdarity which God, 
Creator and Sovereign Master, was pleased to establish 
between the first man and his posterity. This conduct 
might present some difficulty, if the victims of the 
original solidarity had found themselves wronged in 
their strict and individual rights as creatures. But 
such was not the case; the goods of which mankind 
remains deprived on account of their own fault were not 
due to it. The Creator was free to refuse them purely 
and simply; with much more reason could He make 
depend their possession upon any condition He pleased. 



CHAPTER XIV. 



THE PATRIARCHAL RELIGION OR PRIMITIVE 
MONOTHEISM. 

ONE of the most predominant errors of our days 
among the rationalistic exegetists is tliat the 
patriarchs of the Old Testament had no knowledge of 
the dogma of the unity of God. According to certain 
critics, the teaching of the Bible that the antediluvian 
patriarchs were monotheists, must be looked upon as 
fabulous and legendary. According to others, mono- 



PATRIARCHAL RELIGION. 22^ 

theism made its first appearance in the eighth, or even 
only in the seventh century before our era, that is in 
the epoch of the great prophets who are looked upon as 
the real originators of monotheism. This doctrine, they 
pretend, is a product of evolution and of the progress 
of ideas among the Hebrews. At first they had only 
one local, national religion, which became in time a 
universal religion, under the influence of prophetism. 

The arguments certain Rationalists make use of 
to establish the above theory are derived from circum- 
stances connected with the sanctuary at Bethel and 
Betyles; other critics find in the Teraphim, or small 
idols, which Rachel had stolen from her brother Laban, 
the evidence of patriarchal idolatry; the majority, how- 
ever, support themselves especially on the laws of evo- 
lution. 

Thus in the first place, according to the enemies of 
the Bible, there was a Chanaanite sanctuary at Bethel 
which the Hebrews adopted when they invaded Pales- 
tine, and of which they made a place of worship until the 
reform of Josias. 

Apart from the answer we have given already in a 
preceding chapter in regard to this point, we will add: 
the precise indications of the Bible are in formal 
contradiction with this theory. Bethel was primitively 
called Luza (Gen. xviii, 19); Abraham had raised an 
altar there in honor of the true God (Gen. xii, 8); it 
received its name Bethel from Jacob, after the vision 
he had in this place, as we will evidence further on. In 
the time of the Judges we can see, indeed, the Ark of 
the Covenant established at Bethel, but only as a tem- 
porary institution, and undoubtedly on account of the 
war (Judg. xx, 2^^ then being waged. From this time 



228 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

until, the schism of the kingdom, there is no further 
mention of a sanctuary erected at Bethel. True, after 
the schism, Jeroboam erected two golden calves and 
located one at Bethel, where he raises an altar and insti- 
tutes a priesthood (3 Kings xii, 29 fT.) But this pre- 
cisely proves that before Jeroboam, Bethel was not a 
sanctuary, but that it was selected for this purpose 
because of its having been the place of a sanctuary in 
a period more remote. Moreover, the action of Jero- 
boam cannot be looked upon as in accordance with the 
Hebrew religion; it was a schismatic and idolatrous 
action, and above all, a political measure intended to 
keep away the Israelites from Jerusalem, whither they 
considered themselves bound to go, because here was 
located the only legitimate sanctuary. The poHtical 
system would have been of very short duration, had 
Jeroboam left his subjects free to go and sacrifice at 
Jerusalem, and had he not completed his work by a 
religious schism. Since that time we find Bethel men- 
tioned as a sanctuary, but it is a schismatic sanctuary, 
which proves nothing more against monotheism and 
the unity of the sanctuary at the Hebrews, than the 
different schisms of Protestantism prove against the 
unity of the Catholic Church. 

In regard to the '' Teraphim," we have to observe 
that nobody knows exactly in what they consisted. 
Nothing proves that they were real idols, which they 
considered as real deities; perhaps they were only 
aniulets, magic or superstitious objects, which implied 
in no manner the beHef in the plurality of gods. But 
supposing that Rachel adored them as gods, what would 
result from this? That Rachel had not completely 
abandoned the polytheistic belief of Mesopotamia; not 



PATRIARCHAL RELIGION. 229 

at all that Jacob, who proscribed the Teraphim (Gen. 
XXXV, 2, 4), himself was a polytheist. 

When Jacob, the RationaHsts argue, did not adore 
the Teraphim, he at least committed an idolatrous act 
in consecrating Betyles. It is sufficient to read Genesis 
in order to be convinced that there is nothing that 
savors idolatry or polytheism in the action of Jacob. 
Whilst going to his uncle Laban after having had the 
mysterious vision, " Jacob, arising in the morning, took 
the stone, which he had laid under his head, and set it 
up for a title, pouring oil upon the top of it, and he 
called the name of the place Bethel — house of God. 
(Gen. xviii, 18-19.) Later, God having appeared to 
the patriarch in the same place: '' Jacob sets up a monu- 
ment of stone in the place where God had spoken to 
him, pouring drink offerings upon it, and pouring oil 
thereon, and calHng the name of that place Bethel." 
(Gen. XXXV, 14-15.) In these two passages, the stone 
(or stones, for in the second place there were perhaps 
several) is called, not betyles, but masebdh. This is 
an important point to be noted. The word masebdh 
in Hebrew may signify column, stela, statue, monument, 
raised object in remembrance of an event; it is not an 
aerolite, and much less is it an idol. Consequently, it 
is impossible to draw any conclusion from the erection 
of these masebdh by Jacob against the purity of his 
monotheistic belief; in his history, like in that of Abra- 
ham, Isaac, Joseph, Moses, Josue, Judges and of the 
first kings, we meet nothing that is in opposition 
with monotheism. 

The God of the Hebrews is not a local God, but the 
universal God, the master of heaven and earth which 
He has created, the God of man whom He created 



230 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

after His image (Gen. i, 26-27), the " Judge of the 
entire world " (Gen. xviii-xix), the " God of the spirits 
of all flesh " (Num. xvi, 22; xxvii, 16). In the numer- 
ous oracles of the prophets against the foreign nations, 
Jehovah appears to us as God of Egypt, of Chaldea, of 
Assyria, of Phenicia, as well as of Palestine, but the 
prophets did not conceive the idea of monotheism. The 
God of the Pentateuch is no national God, He is also 
the sole God and the God of the whole world. The 
first eleven chapters of Genesis occupy themselves with 
humanity in general. The Decalogue is not a particu- 
lar code, but a universal code. The love of the neigh- 
bor is not only the love of the Israelites, but the love 
of all men (Lev. xix, 18, 34). The Bible alone teaches 
us the unity of all mankind, and thus it alone teaches 
universal fraternity, by informing us that we all have 
one and the same Father who is God. As it is our 
Saviour who has taught us to say: Our Father who art 
in heaven, it is the first chapter of the Bible which 
teaches us the truth expressed by these words. It is 
also the Pentateuch which teaches us that the true God 
has no sensible form which can be represented by any 
image, because He is above all material forms and the 
Being par excellence the " One Who Is." 

As a matter of fact, the avowed or concealed princi- 
ple upon which the infidels support themselves, who 
deny the primitive monotheism of Israel, is the princi- 
ple of Evolution. They refuse to admit a primitive 
revelation, and they pretend that the religious ideas 
have progressed as have the sciences and arts, the 
plants and animals, according to the Darwinian theory. 
But history gives the lie to their assertions. The first 
men have been monotheists, and their descendants, 



PATRIARCHAL RELIGION. 23 I 

instead of progressing in religion, fell away more and 
more, mitil the coming of Christianity. George Raw- 
linson has devoted an entire work to the study of this 
important fact, and this is the conclusion he arrives at : 
" The historic review which has been here made lends 
no support to the theory that there is a uniform growth 
and progress of religions from fetichishi to polytheism, 
from polytheism to monotheism, and from monotheism 
to positivism, as maintained by the followers of Comte. 
None of the religions here described shows any signs 
of having been developed out of fetichism, unless it be 
the shamanism of the Etruscans. In most of them the 
monotheistic idea is most prominent at first, and gradu- 
ally becomes obscured and gives way before a polythe- 
istic corruption. In all, there is one element at least, 
which appears to be traditional, viz., sacrifice, for it can 
scarcely have been by the exercise of his reason that 
man came so generally to believe that the superior 
powers, whatever they were, would be pleased by the 
violent death of one or more of their creatures. Alto- 
gether, the theory to which the facts appear on the 
whole point is the existence of the primitive religion, 
communicated to man from without, whereof mono- 
theism and expiatory sacrifice were parts, and the 
gradual clouding of this primitive revelation every- 
where, unless it were among the Hebrews." (G. Rawlin- 
son, "Ancient Religion," p. 175.) 



CHAPTER XV. 



THE BOOK OF EXODUS. 

A PORTION of the events related in Exodus and 
Numbers are miraculous and supernatural. For 
this reason negative criticism rejects them a priori 
without waiting to make an examination. Other events 
of this epoch do not offer the same objectionable 
feature, but the Rationalists refuse equally to admit 
them in order to be able more easily to deny the prodi- 
gies in the others, and to deprive Moses of the composi- 
tion of the Pentateuch. What in their eyes is sufficient 
to destroy credence in the accounts of the sacred his- 
torian, is the improbability. According to them we 
cannot accept as veracious accounts which are shocking 
common sense on each page. 

I. THE PERSECUTION OF THE HEBREWS IN EGYPT. 

E. Reuss does not dare to deny openly that the 
Hebrews could not have been persecuted in Egypt, but 
many details, in the account of this event, appear to 
him very contestable. This is what he says: ''The 
events contained in the Books of Exodus and Numbers 
are they related by a contemporary and eye witness? 
The account commences by stating that, after having 
passed through a period, more or less long, of pros- 
perity, the Israelites established in Egypt found them- 
selves exposed to attacks and persecution by the 
nationals who were afraid of them, and who by all 
(232) 



THE BOOK OF EXODUS. 233 

kinds of means endeavored to weaken them, especially 
by employing them at hard labor on the public works, 
There is absolutely nothing improbable in this. We 
know from oth^r sources that there have been in Egypt 
numerous dynastic revolutions, and that foreign rulers, 
probably Semitics, ended by being overpowered by 
native aspirants. We can understand that the colony 
which had come formerly from Canaan became involved 
in the defeat of those who had been their protectors. 
However, we have to admit that we find here only a 
partial evidence of such an event which, if proved, 
would have to be admitted as readily explaining the 
change of fortune of the Israelites in Egypt." (" Die 
heilige Geschichte und das Gesetz," vol. i.) 

The Book of Exodus expressly states that the new 
king who persecuted the Hebrews '' knew not Joseph " 
(Ex. i, 8). The author does not enter into details, pre- 
cisely because all the readers at that time knew very well 
that the Hyksos or Shepherd Kings had been expelled 
by the native Pharaohs, and because it was sufficient for 
him to briefly indicate this revolution. The Hyksos were 
not simply the protectors of the Hebrews, as Reuss 
says, but the}^ were of the same race, and both had in 
Egypt the sameinterests, consequently, they had to make 
united resistance to the native kings in the war which 
the latter had made against the conquerors of Lower 
Egypt; they had also to undergo the evil consequences 
of the defeat. The hatred of the Egyptians against the 
Asiatics who had held, during several centuries under 
their power, the most beautiful part of Egypt, is revealed 
by a very great number of monuments. It required not 
less than one hundred and fifty years of war for the 
Egyptian patriots to triumph completely over the power 



234 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

of the Ilyksos. Yet the Pharaoh Ahmes, their conqueror, 
was obUged to grant to them, according to Manetho, 
a capitulation which permitted the rest of the hostile 
army to withdraw into the countries of Canaan and of 
Aram. It was quite natural for the IsraeHtes to defend 
in the ranks of the Hyksos, the land which they had 
received from the munificence of the latter in the time 
of Joseph. Some of them must have accompanied their 
compatriots to places in Syria where they took refuge 
after their defeat. This is confirmed by a monument 
of Karnak. It proclaims that between the death of 
Joseph and the exodus, the Pharaoh Thotmes III had 
warred against other enemies in Palestine, those termed 
in the royal hst as Jacobel and Josephel, that is, we 
believe, descendants of Jacob and Joseph. Indeed, we 
read in the list of the people or tribes, which comprised 
the allied army defeated by Thotm_es III at Mageddo: 
Jakobaal, Jo sepal (Cf. I, Par. vii, 21-24). 

The role which the Israelites must have played in the 
last war of the Hyksos explains easily how the conquer- 
ing Pharaohs must have treated the Israelites, who had 
been conquered with the ancient invaders. They kept 
them in bondage, like many other prisoners of war of 
whom there is mention in the hieroglyphic monuments, 
because they were in need of them to assist in the erec- 
tion of public works, and kept them under a strict 
surveillance to prevent them from increasing in too 
great a number, and from uniting with their former allies 
in the event of their return to Egypt with hostile inten- 
tions. Moses does not speak of these facts, because it 
was not his aim at all to make known the reasons the 
Pharaohs had to persecute his brethern; to attain his 
end, he had to dwell on the grievances of the Israelites 



THE BOOK OF EXODUS. 235 

against the Egyptians, not those of the Egyptians 
against the Israelites. Therefore, he speaks as he should 
speak, but the Egyptian history completes for us what 
he passed by in silence, and by revealing to us which 
did not enter into his plan to relate, it shows us how 
everything related in the Sacred Text agrees with the 
original monuments. 

E. Reuss continues: ''Moses is not sufficiently exact; 
he continually speaks of the King Pharaoh, but does 
not tell whether it is the one whose daughter found 
him in the river, or the one from whom he asked the 
deliverance of his people." Let us observe, in the first 
place, that it is false to state that Exodus names the 
King of Egypt " the King of Pharaoh;" never are these 
two names joined together, never is the title Pharaoh 
given as a proper name. When the text designates the 
Pharaoh by his title, and never otherwise, it is easy to 
discover the reason; it is because the Israelites called 
him always thus, and because the first consideration 
of Moses was to write for their understanding. To-day 
the governor of a State is almost always referred to 
as '' the governor," and a great number of citizens 
trouble themselves very little to know his real name. 
It was the same in regard to the Pharaohs among the 
children of Jacob; they ignored for the most the list 
of the pompous and complicated names which the 
sovereigns displayed in their public acts, and Moses had 
no desire to enlighten his co-religionists on this subject; 
for them it was simply the Pharaoh. 

Besides Reuss insinuates falsely that " the state- 
ments of Exodus are never precise in dealing with 
proper names." Just as Genesis makes known to us 
the names, when it is necessary, e. g., that of Putiphar 



236 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

master of Joseph, and of Asenath, his wife, daughter 
of another Putiphar, priest of On, so also Exodus 
names the two midwives, Sephora and Phua, who re- 
fused to execute the barbarous orders of the Egyptian 
sovereign, as well as the two cities at which the Hebrews 
w^ere obliged to work — Ramses and Pithon. 

When Moses '' does not speak of the persecutor of 
the E[ebrew except under the title of Pharaoh," he de- 
scribes him in features and characteristics sufficiently 
distinct to recognize in him Ramses II, the conqueror 
so well known under the name of Seostris. This terri- 
ble monarch who persecuted so cruelly the Hebrews, 
and from whom Moses had to fly, we know well through, 
the numerous monuments with which he has covered 
Egypt, and by means of his numerous statues, and even 
to-day the photograph of his mummy can be seen in the 
Museum of Boulak. 

" The account of Exodus proves quite a very poor 
knowledge," says Reuss {opus cit.), " of the situation of 
the IsraeHtes in Egypt, in the epoch when Moses came to 
be their leader. In telling that the new-born boys should 
be drowned immediately by the Egyptians, the narrator 
supposes that the Israelites were all established on the 
shores of the Nile. ..." Moses does not sup- 
pose that the Israelites were all established on the 
shores of the Nile, but he supposes, and with good right, 
that there were all over Egypt canals fed by the Nile, 
which served to irrigate the lands, and which served 
also, in time of persecution, as convenient places to dis- 
pose of the newly born. If Reuss had studied the 
works on Egyptiology, in order to attack the Penta- 
teuch, he would have read that Ramses II had caused 
the repairing, even in the Land of Gessen, of a canal 



THE BOOK OF EXODUS. 237 

of which the hieroglyphic texts speak, and the remains 
of which were discovered at a recent date. He con- 
nected the Nile with lake Timsah, and this canal trav- 
ersed the center of the countr}^ which the Hebrews 
inhabited. The papyri describe the city of Ramses, 
Pa-Ramessu da-ndht, and they speak of the practice of 
fishing in the waters that watered it, although this 
city was not on the shore of the Nile. 

'' From where did the Hebrews get their meat in 
Egypt," asks Reuss. And he answers: " From their 
flocks undoubtedly." In this he deceives himself. 
Here, like in so many other places, the critic is not 
sufficiently schooled in the Egyptian customs, nor the 
customs of the nomad shepherd, and hence his error. 
The flesh which the Israelites regretted (Num. xi, a, 13) 
whilst in the desert referred to the numberless birds 
which swarm on the shores of the Nile and its surround- 
ing canals. We see them often figuring in the Egyptian 
monuments, which serve us here as illustrations and 
commentaries. All those who know the habits of the 
shepherd peoples, are well acquainted with the fact that 
they live chiefly on milk-food, and that they eat the 
meat of their sheep only under very exceptionable cir- 
cumstances. In Egypt the children of Jacob must have 
eaten very little of what we call butcher's meat, but if 
they wished to have a feast, they also indulged in various 
kinds of fowl and game. This is what they regretted in 
the desert, where their eyes, they say, beheld only manna. 
For the proof that their appetite did not crave beef or 
mutton is evidenced in the manner by which God ceased 
their murmuring: He sends them quail, not cattle. 

Besides we must not forget that the Hebrews 
did not complain only for not having any longer pots 



238 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

full of fleshmeat like those of the Nile valley; they are 
equally afflicted for being deprived of the vegetables 
of Egypt, of the onion and leek, which were indeed the 
favorite nourishment of the Egyptians, as is evidenced 
by their figured monuments. The Israelites were de- 
prived of both the meat and vegetables of their liking 
while in the desert. What is more natural than their 
regretting the foods to which they had long been 
accustomed? This feature, far from being improbable, 
as Reuss pretends, is, on the contrary, like so many 
others, a striking confirmation of the perfect knowl- 
edge which the author of the Pentateuch had of Egypt. 
1-1 ow could an author, hving in Palestine, several cen- 
turies after the events, have known so well the tastes 
of the inhabitants of the Nile valley? The figured 
monuments in. this, as elsewhere, show us the exactitude 
of the geographic picture of Exodus, and we have cer- 
tainly the right to conclude, from a description so 
accurately corroborated by hieroglyphics, that the 
writer has seen the places which he has so perfectly 
described, and that he has lived in the midst of the 
people whose customs and usages are so familiar to him. 
The progress of Egyptian archaeology, far from reveal- 
ing errors in the accounts of Moses, have caused, on the 
contrary, the disappearance forever of doubts which 
had no other foundation than ignorance. All the 
modern discoveries strikingly confirm the veracity of 
the sacred historian. 

2. THE EXISTENCE OF THE TABERNACLE. 

According to the infidel critic, the Tabernacle did 
never exist. The Temple of Jerusalem and the Taber- 
nacle are one and the same thing. Behold what Renan 



THE BOOK OF EXODUS. 239 

says in regard to this subject: "The existence of the 
Tabernacle is only a childish imagination, worthy of 
the jokes of Voltaire, its conception supposes the 
absolute contempt of the reality, its implements are 
whimsical, the whole is contained in the mind of Eze- 
chiel, the man of plans which cannot be realized, and of 
chimerical combinations." (" Les origines de la Bible.") 
But are these big words arguments? Will it be suf- 
ficient for the infidel, who does not wish to believe in 
the existence of the great pyramid, to affirm that this 
structure is the invention of a childish imagination, 
which counts reality as nothing? That it is evidently 
an idle fancy to suppose a mass of stones, 696 feet wide, 
426 feet high, and consisting in all of about 78,000,000 of 
cubic feet and destined to serve as a tomb for one single 
man? The monument of Cheops will be, nevertheless, 
a reality always existing. The Tabernacle of Israel 
differs from it in this that it does not exist any longer, 
but it differs also from it in this that it was of much 
easier construction, and at the same time something 
more reasonable. Indeed, what could be more natural 
for a rehgious people like the children of Jacob than 
to desire a tent which served them as a temple, 
and which replaced in some measure those grand tem- 
ples which they had seen in Egypt? What could be 
more easy than to satisfy their desire? Living them- 
selves in tents, accustomed, like all nomads, to see their 
chief dwelling in a larger and more ornamental tent 
than those of the other members of the tribe, they were 
influenced by the very circumstances of their habits 
and customs to erect the Tabernacle in honor of Jeho- 
vah and to ornament it with all the magnificence they 
were capable of. 



240 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

The doubters assure us, with a large supply of 
affirmations and without giving the least positive proof, 
that the temple of Solomon was the prototype of the 
Tabernacle attributed to Moses. But how does it come 
that all the Books of the Old Testament teach us the 
contrary? '' The authors of the Pentateuch," they say, 
" have invented the Tabernacle in all its parts." But in 
fact if it had existed only in their imagination, how 
could they have ventured to make it play such an impor- 
tant role in the sacred history? The Pentateuch is, so 
to say, full of the Tabernacle from beginning of Exodus. 
It is not only once or twice that it is mentioned, it is 
a multitude of times. Before the erection of the defini- 
tive Tabernacle, there is a provisional Tabernacle 
(Exod. xxxiii, 7; cf. xxxv, lo-ii). With what object 
could the latter have been imagined by the last Jewish 
writers? After the portable temple had been con- 
structed it is connected with all the events, and its name 
appears on each page in Leviticus and Numbers, as in 
the last chapter of Exodus. Also in the Book of Josue, 
the Tabernacle occupies the same place as in the last 
Books of the Pentateuch. 

The great argument furnished against the authen- 
ticity of the Tabernacle is that it was impossible to con- 
struct it in the desert of Sinai. Now, nothing is more 
contrary to the truth, and nothing shows better the 
veracity of the sacred historian than the details which he 
gives us of the building of the Tabernacle. These details 
indicate a perfect knowledge of Sinai and its means, and 
a Jewish writer, writing several centuries after the 
exodus, could not have imagined the construction of a 
Tabernacle like that of Moses. 

The sacred narrator tells us that the solid part of 



THE BOOK OF EXODUS. 24I 

the Tabernacle, and the furniture destined for the wor- 
ship, were built of sitthn wood, that is, of seyal accacia. 
An author who would have written m Palestine would 
never have supposed this, for the reason that they did 
not use this wood in the interior of Canaan, where it 
could not be found. The peninsula of Sinai produces 
scarcely more than three kinds of trees: the palm tree, 
the tamarisk and the accacia. Of these three kinds, 
the first two are unfit for cabinet work; the seyal 
accacia possesses, on the contrary, all the properties 
which Moses could desire for the use he wished to make 
of it; its wood makes excellent planks; it is, moreover, 
very light, an invaluable quality for the Israelites who 
were obliged to carry along the Tabernacle with them, 
each time they changed camp; despite its Httle weight, 
this wood is very durable and preserves itself for a long 
tinie; finally, it becomes darker as it grows older, and 
takes on a kind of ebony hue; hence, it is fitted for the 
manufacture of very beautiful furniture, such as the 
Hebrews constructed in the desert for the usage of wor- 
ship. 

The employment of seyal accacia in the desert of 
Sinai confirms, therefore, the exactitude of the accounts 
of Exodus. We find another confirmation of the ve- 
racity of the sacred historian in an analogous detail 
which refers also to the Tabernacle. We read in Exodus 
that they covered the Tabernacle with skins of tahas, 
a word which is generally agreed to-day to mean the 
dugong. This large aquatic herbivorous mam^mal of 
the order of Sirenia is common in the Red Sea, where 
they are found in shoals. The Israelites, in a place 
bordering the sea, were easily enabled to obtain this fish, 
but in Palestine they could not have done so. 

D. B.— 16 



242 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

A final objection is made against the building of the 
Tabernacle. There are, it is claimed, works of art 
which it was impossible to manufacture in the desert. 
As for the metals used in the manufacture of the imple- 
ments of the Tabernacle, the bronze was furnished 
partly by the women who possessed looking-glasses of 
poHshed metals, and who offered them for the manufac- 
ture of the brazen laver (Ex. xxxviii, 8); the gold and 
the silver were given in abundance by the Israelites of 
every condition who possessed precious jewelry, which, 
as our modern museums still evidence, was superabun- 
dant in Egypt. During their sojourn in the land of the 
Pharaohs the children of Jacob necessarily accumulated 
a vast amount of this jewelry, which they augmented, 
as Moses relates, during the preparations for the exodus 
(Ex. iii, 23; xi, 2; xii, 35-36). He states that the 
Israelites carried off many precious objects which they 
received from the Egyptians. 



CHAPTER XVI. 



THE TEN PLAGUES OF EGTPT. 

THE children of Jacob having gone down to Egypt 
with their father, multiplied themselves in such a 
manner, that the Pharaoh, fearful of an uprising, and 
in order to prevent the IsraeHtes from Jjecoming too 
numerous, forced them to engage in the most severe 
labor that tyranny could devise. God wished to deliver 
His people from this bondage, and He sent to the 



THE TEN PLAGUES OF EGYPT. 243 

Pharaoh, Moses and Aaron to demand of him in His 
name that the IsraeUtes be permitted to depart. The 
Pharaoh refused, notwithstanding the proofs which 
Moses furnished to prove the divinity of his mission. 
Moses then called on God for aid, and He descended on 
the Egyptians the series of afflictions which are termed 
the Ten Plagues of Egypt. Formerly, the RationaUsts 
not wishing to admit the supernatural character of these 
plagues, were obliged to denounce the Mosaic account 
as a preposterous fiction. Modern research in the 
antiquities of Egypt, has established that what Moses 
related could have happened, and, moreover, some of 
the things he mentions are still noticeable in that land 
of marvel. Thus frustrated, the infidel attack was 
turned in another direction to arrive at the same result. 
They admit the plagues as historical, but deny their 
nuraculous origin. 

This assertion is as false as the first; undoubtedly 
some of the scourges mentioned in Exodus had already 
been experienced by the Egyptians, and under different 
circumstances were due to natural causes, but on this 
occasion everything goes to prove that they were 
supernatural; their sudden production and cessation 
on the order of Moses; their intensity, and especially 
the fact that the land of Gessen, inhabited by the 
Hebrews, experienced none of the horrors; add to this 
the astonishment of the Egyptians who, although 
accustomed to these scourges, on this occasion saw 
evidenced in them a proof of the divine power permitted 
to Moses; and, finally, compare these plagues with the 
testimony furnished by Egyptiology and the compari- 
son will establish their authenticity, and also their super- 
natural origin. 



244 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

First Plague.— '' Moses," states the Book of 
Exodus (vii, 20), '' lifting up the rod struck the water, 
and it was changed into blood." The Nile is an- 
nually subject to a phenomenon which resembles 
this scourge. At the period of overflow, the water 
becomes brackish, and the river takes on that ap- 
pearance which has given it the designation of 
the ''Green Nile;" while in this condition the water 
is not fit for drinking purposes. Then, at the end of 
three or four days the water changes in color to a dark 
red hue, '' more similar " says Osborn, '' to blood than 
to any other matter with which 1 should compare it." 
This is the phenomenon of the '' Red Nile," during 
which period the water is very healthful and palatable 
when used for drink. When this phenomenon became 
known, the Rationalists cried out: '' Behold the Mosaic 
scourge! It produces itself annually, and in the most 
natural manner." Some Catholic apologists maintain 
that the first plague of Egypt was the phenomenon 
of the Red Nile, but produced by Moses in a miraculous 
manner. 

The opinion of these Catholics does not seem to be 
well founded, and we have the right to reject absolutely 
that of the Rationalists. In the first place, we say: 
You acknowledge, as we do, that it was not more diffi- 
cult for God to have changed the Nile into blood, than 
to have given it only the appearance of blood. Let us, 
therefore, agree with the Fathers and Doctors of the 
Church, who have always seen in the first plague a 
transformation of the water of the Nile into real blood, 
and some of these Fathers and Doctors were well ac- 
quainted with Egypt and the phenomenon of the Red 
Nile. 



THE TEN PLAGUES OF EGYPT. 245 

In fact: i. The effects of these plagues were noticed 
at Tamis, where the court was located, and where 
Moses was pleading for the deliverance of his people. 
Now, the phenomenon of the Red Nile does not 
occur on this site in the present day, and it is, therefore, 
evident that it did not do so in the time of Moses, at 
least, not in the natural manner of this annual event. 
2. It is in July, generally, that the Nile becomes red; 
now, we know, through Exodus, that the tenth plague 
took place at the beginning of April (xii, 18), the seventh 
in March (ix, 31), and the second, seven days after the 
first (vii, 25). A comparison of the time between these 
three plagues indicates that the ten plagues were sepa- 
rated from one another only by intervals of about seven 
days, and that, consequently, the changing of the Nile 
took place in February, a month in which the phenom- 
enon of the Red Nile never occurs. 3. " The fishes that 
were in the river died, and the river corrupted, and the 
Egyptians could not drink the waters of the river " 
(vii, 21). These are circumstances of the Mosaic 
miracle which the Rationalists cannot explain by their 
hypothesis, because the water of the Nile is never more 
healthful than at the period of the Red Nile. The 
red water or blood which the Nile became, under the 
stroke of the rod of Moses, cannot, therefore, be 
explained by natural causes, but by the admission of a 
miracle. 

Second Plague. — This plague was an invasion 
of frogs; a real scourge, peculiar to Egypt, which 
fact helps to establish the authenticity of the Mosaic 
account; but it was also a supernatural manifesta- 
tion at the same time. In fact: i. Egypt was 
never infested with these animals as it was in the 



246 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

time of the second Mosaic plague, on which occa- 
sion the frogs entered the apartments, covering the 
floors and furniture, and the utensils of household usage; 
all facts which suppose an immense number of these 
animals which behaved, moreover, in a manner entirely 
foreign to their instincts and habits. 2. The time of 
the year when frogs are most numerous in Egypt is that 
w^iich follows the overflow of the Nile, whilst the inva- 
sion produced by Moses preceded the inundation. 3. 
The frogs appeared all on a sudden, when Aaron 
stretched forth his hand over the water (viii, 6), and they 
departed at the moment fixed by the Pharaoh himself, and 
besides, the supernatural character of the scourge was 
acknowledged by the Egyptians, as evidenced in the 
request of Pharaoh to Moses to rid the land of that pest. 

Third Plague. — At the stroke of Aaron's rod 
" there arose sciniphs (gnats and flies) on man and 
beast.'' The word sciniphs used in Exodus (viii, 
13-17), apparently means various poisonous flies and 
insects. Origen considers sciniphs to refer to swarms 
of mosquitos (Hom. iv). The Greek Bible, trans- 
lated by Jews who, like Origen, lived in Egypt, uses 
the word '^sciniphs,' which not only applies to com- 
paratively harmless insects, but also to winged pests, 
which were fatal even to horses and cattle. 

Whatever may be the meaning of sciniphs, one 
thing is certain that immense swarms infest Egypt, and 
Moses makes use of some kind of insects to compel the 
Pharaoh, always obstinate in his refusal, to permit the 
Hebrews to depart. 

Fourth Plague. — The mosquitos were followed 
by flies not less insupportable (viii, 24). The foregoing 
observations apply also to this plague. The abun- 



THE TEN PLAGUES OF EGYPT. 247 

dance of flies in Egypt confirms the historical character 
of the account; the fright of the Pharaoh, and the 
concessions which he commences to make to Moses, 
show very well that there was something supernatural 
in this plague, where they again witnessed the hand of 
God. 

Fifth Plague. — Pharaoh having retracted his 
promises, after having been delivered from, the 
scourge of the flies, God struck the animals of the 
Egyptians with a disease which caused them to 
perish in great numbers. Here again one cannot 
deny the supernatural character of this plague, although 
the epizootics may be frequent in Egypt; the Biblical 
plague begins and ceases at the precise moment desig- 
nated by Moses, and Pharaoh himself testifies that the 
animals belonging to the Hebrews were exempted from 
it (xi, 7). The land of Gessen was spared equally from 
the sixth plague. 

Sixth Plague.— In the sixth plague the hand of 
God descended still more heavily upon the Egyptians, 
for now they themselves were smitten. The pest with 
which God miraculously inflicted the Egyptians in this 
scourge attacked all the Egyptians without exception, 
high and low, rich and poor. Even the magicians were 
not spared. Its miraculous character was evidenced by 
the fact that it arose at the precise moment when 
Moses, by the command of God, took ashes and threw 
them into the air, under the eyes of the heart-hardened 
Pharaoh. 

Seventh Plague.—AH these afflictions were with- 
out efifect in obtaining the release of the Israelites. 
Moses went to the king and addressed him thus: "To- 
morrow at this same hour an exceedingly great hail 



248 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

shall take place, such as had not been in Egypt from 
the day that it was founded, until the present time; men 
and beasts and all things that shall be found abroad, 
and not gathered together out of the fields, which the 
hail falls upon, shall die " (ix, 18). The Pharaoh fright- 
ened promised to grant to Moses all he desires if he will 
stretch forth his hand and cease the plague. 

Eighth Plague.— The work of destruction began 
by the hail, was completed by an immense invasion of 
locusts. The ravages which an army of these innumer- 
able and voracious insects create when they invade a 
fertile field, are summed up in the epigrammatic utter- 
ance of Vigouroux: '' Before them a paradise; behind 
them a desert." The invasion which took place in this 
epoch was much more dreadful than any that had ever 
been experienced, and it arrived at the hour, and with 
the intensity foretold by Moses. The Egyptians were 
astounded; seldom had they felt this scourge, and never 
in so terrible a manner. The entire population felt the 
effect of this plague. Pharaoh was humbled and sub- 
mitted, but only to become obstinate again. 

Ninth Plague. — The obstinacy of the king was 
punished by a ninth plague: darkness so thick that it 
could be felt, figuratively speaking, covered the land 
of Egypt (x, 21). The supernatural features of the 
ninth plague are: its instantaneous production, in 
accordance with the coinmand of Moses, the exemption 
of the land of Gessen, and the duration of the scourge. 

Tenth Plague. — As Pharaoh seemed determined to 
resist the divine command, the Almighty finally, as it 
were, prepared a decisive stroke. The exterminating 
angel destroved all the firstborn of the land of Egypt, 
from the firstborn of the Pharaoh, vv^ho sitteth on his 



THE CROSSING OF THE RED SEA. 249 

throne, even to the firstborn of the handmaid that is 
at the mill, and all the firstborn of beasts (xi, 5). Here 
the supernatural character of the scourge cannot be 
questioned, even if the exterminating angel would have 
employed natural means, like pest for instance. With 
regard to the historical accuracy of the tenth plague, it 
is confirmed by the Egyptiological discoveries: the 
monuments reveal to us that Menephtah, the Pharaoh 
of the exodus, had associated with him on the throne 
his eldest son; but they also give us to understand that 
his son died before his father, because this firstborn 
called himself Menephtah, and the successor of the 
Pharaoh bore the name of Sethos. 

From all we have related it is evident that the 
authenticity of the Pentateuch is clearly established, 
aad that it is not in the history of the Plagues of Egypt 
that ammunition can be obtained to destroy its veracity. 
On the contrary, all research confirms the Biblical nar- 
rative, and we can say once more that the finger of God 
was there. 



CHAPTER XVn. 



THE CROSSING OF THE RED SEA. 

THE route followed by the Hebrews when leaving 
Egypt, and the spot where they crossed the Red 
Sea, has given rise to many inquiries and controversies. 
From the apologetical point of view, the only one which 
occupies us here, we enter the discussion to refute the 



250 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

systems which tend to deprive this event of its miracu- 
lous character. 

I. According to M. Brugsch, the Hebrews passed 
from Egypt into Asia, not by way of the Red Sea, but by 
the Isthmus of Suez; from here they passed along the 
Mediterranean Sea. Now, in this locahty there are many 
lagoons called Serbonis, which are separated from the 
Mediterranean only by a long and narrow slrip of 
land; it was upon this narrow road where the Hebrews 
found themselves, when the Egyptians wished to 
recapture them. During this attempt, that is, while 
the Egyptians were in pursuit of the Hebrews, a 
high sea arose and, engulfing this jetty or isthmus-like 
projection, swallowed up the enemies of the people of 
God.- — We have to reject this theory for the follow- 
ing reasons: i. In order to establish it, the author is 
forced to have recourse to descriptions and geograph- 
ical identifications which are absolutely imaginary, as 
posterior voyages have proven. 2. Exodus does not 
speak of a passage on the shores of a sea, but of a 
crossing of the sea, which is something quite different; 
moreover, it does not speak of the Mediterranean, but 
of the Red Sea; it is true that Exodus designates this 
sea Yam Souf, '' sea of weeds; " but it is thus that this 
sea is called in the Old Testament, and it is certain that 
this name is that of the sea called Red Sea by the 
Greeks. Lake Serbonis, whatever Brugsch may claim, 
cannot have been this '' sea of weeds," for its waters 
are inimical, as are those of the Dead Sea, to all lacus- 
tral vegetation. 3. Finally, the result of this theory 
would be to destroy the miraculous character of the 
Biblical account: '' The miracle," says Brugsch, " ceases 
then to l^e a miracle;" he adds, it is true, that Provi- 



THF CROSSING OF THE RED SEA. 25 1 

dence plays its role nevertheless therein, and that his 
theory is orthodox; but this is a declaration which his 
adherents themselves do not take as serious. 

2. Thus, one of the reasons which compel us to reject 
the theory of Brugsch is that it destroys the miraculous 
character of the passage of the Yam Souf; indeed, this 
character is unquestionable, and hence, we must, in 
considering other theories, which have attempted to 
locate the place of the miraculous passage of the Red 
Sea, distinguish two things: the place and the character 
of the passage. As to the exact place, we do not need 
to discuss that here, but as to the supernatural character 
of the event we cannot say Hke Josephus: '' Let each 
one think about it what seems best to him." Du Bois- 
Aymee, Salvador, etc., wished to behold in this fact only 
a purely natural event. They suppose that the passage 
was effected by fording a sort of high ground which 
the low sea had left partially uncovered. The only 
evidence on Avhich their theory is based, is that there 
still exists two fords at the extreme northern or north- 
western point of the Red Sea. To overthrow this 
hypothesis two observations are sufficient: i. "The 
water," says the Sacred Text, " was as a wall on 
the right and on the left hand of the IsraeHtes; " now 
in the hypothesis of Salvador, it is quite the contrary; 
the water would have been below and not above the 
Hebrews. This detail is very important, for it is impos- 
sible to sensibly liken a wall to a ditch. 2. The Red Sea 
was crossed by more than two millions of men, en- 
cumbered with numerous herds; in supposing that they 
formed in files of a thousand men each, it would have 
required at least one full hour before the whole column 
could have entered the sea, and about four hours to 



252 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

effect the crossing. Can any one sensibly maintain 
that this could be done within the space of the sea-tide? 
This is inventing one prodigy to reject another, and, 
moreover, it is torturing a text in order to make it 
state something that it does not contain. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 



MTTHIC ST STEM, 

ACCORDING to the Rationalistc criticism, all the 
personages of Genesis, and particularly Adam, 
Eve, and the antediluvian patriarchs, are only mythical. 
It would take too long to point out what the infidels 
have written on this subject, but fortunately it is not 
necessary to do so. It is useless to refute their fantas- 
tic hypotheses as to the myths; nothing is more conven- 
ient and easier. Certainly it requires the mind of a 
Rationalist to suppose that Noe or Abraham are solar 
myths, Sara and Agar lunar myths, but nobody in the 
world can refute the existence of Adam, Noe, Abraham 
and Sara. This is the actual powerless condition of the 
rationalistic criticism; an important fact to be borne 
in mind. 

There are, however, timid or shallow minds, predis- 
posed to doubt, who feel themselves troubled, or even 
shaken in their convictions, because they are told that 
Adam, the first man, is Zeus kataibateSy that is, a 
Jupiter descending upon earth in the lightning, or a 
Hephaestos (Vulcan), a Dionysos (Bacchus) and a fugi- 
tive Hercules expelled from paradise and what not? 



MYTHIC SYSTEM. 253 

These minds, so easily affrighted, seem to forget that, 
on the one hand nothing is easier than to behold at 
leisure, in a real personage, images and types without 
number, and that on the other, these images, these types 
prove absolutely nothing against the historic reality of 
this personage. The only conclusion one may have the 
right to draw from this, is that the author or authors 
possess more or less ingenious imaginations; but to 
doubt that Adam has existed, because a rationalistic exe- 
getist has imagined that the first man represented Apollo 
or the sun, is the same as if one, in the ages to comx, 
were to doubt that Louis XIV ever reigned over France, 
because some mythologist would afifirm that this great 
king, who was termed Le Grand, and to whom was given 
the sun as an emblem, was nought in fact but a person- 
ification of the sun, typifying by his early triumphs the 
victory of the rising day-orb over the darkness; repre- 
senting in the acme of his glory the noonday acme, res- 
plendent in the heavens; and symbolical in his declining 
years and death, of the expiring monarch day, at length 
overcome by his enemy night. The rationalistic exegesis 
is not a scientific free agent; it sways with the oscilla- 
tions of the infidel philosophy; it undergoes its vicissi- 
tudes; one might say that it follows the caprices of infidel 
fashion. At the present hour the craze is mythology, 
and the rationalistic criticism, in accordance with its 
habitual custom, has transplanted the meteoric or solar 
explanations of the ancient tables into the domain of 
the Scriptures, and thus we are amazed to hear that 
the famous personages of the Old Testament have been 
transform.ed into myths, solar heroes, clouds, tempests, 
etc. But we must not mistake the appearance of 
science for its reality. 



254 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

The mythomania is a real illness of our epoch, and 
many savants, whom one might expect to be above its 
influence, have not escaped contamination. Some have 
fallen into exaggerations which is not out of place to 
point out. Certainly the eiforts to determine the 
origins of the polytheistic reUgions and their myths, is 
deserving of encomium; but here, like all over, the 
abuse is blameworthy. This mythomania has evolved 
from the discoveries made within the last fifty years in 
the linguistics, and in the comparative mythology. 
Formerly almost nothing was known of the origin of 
the myths which relate the adventures of pagan deities; 
they were merely considered as pagan follies. The 
study of the Vedas gives the key to many stories of 
the Greek, Germanic, Asiatic, etc., mythology; here we 
discover real myths in the full sense of the word, meta- 
phorical pictures of the storm or of the action of the sun, 
of the light, etc. Immediately enthusiasm exaggerates 
the bearing of the discovery, and the sting of free 
thought entering into the subject, it is concluded that 
the myths were solely poetic fictions, and, moreover, that 
all religion, at least the supernatural portion, is founded 
on myth, and has no more substantial basis. At first this 
mythologic research was confined to the pagan religions, 
but audacity and desire to invent soon applied the 
system to the Old Testament, to the Gospel, and to all 
our sacred books. The Vedas of India became hence- 
forth the first expression of religion; all else had been 
borrowed from India, all was founded on the myths 
pertaining to the sun, the clouds, and the other phenom- 
ena of light. Adam, Abraham and Samson, for in- 
stance, were ranked in the category of the solar heroes; 
the serpent of Genesis was looked upon as that of the 



MYTHIC SYSTEM. 255 

stormy cloud of the Vedas. Christ himself became a 
mythic hero ; his death was the disappearance of the 
sun in the twilight, his resurrection the retun of the 
sun in the spring or in the aurora, etc. 

The danger of this system, in such great favor at the 
present day, is very considerable. The claim of philos- 
ophy and of geology would still permit Christianity to 
exist, but the mystic system annihilates it. Christian- 
ity is for its followers only a phase of mythology ; a 
superior religion like some others, but inferior in several 
respects. The danger is so much the greater, because 
the mythic system parades before the eyes of many as 
a real conquest and striking discovery ; it opens the way 
to new ones, and invites one to display his perspicacity 
in discovering new myths. Among the mythological 
researches there is an inconceivable infatuation, a real 
mania. With them a faint analogy immediately estab- 
lishes a myth. We will evidence this by quoting a few 
examples : 

The Hindoo gods, which we find among the Greeks 
and Latins, seem to be in reality only personifications 
of the sun and of the planets. So, also, the great 
Egyptian god, Ra, as well as the Chanaanite deity par 
excellence, Baal, are both the sun. Now, because these 
orbs have been personified in the polytheism of India, 
Egypt, Chanaan, Greece, Rome or Gaul, the conclusion 
is deducted that the Biblical patriarchs, Isaac, Jacob, 
Esau, are also personifications of heavenly bodies. 
Where is the connection ? Where Is the proof ? 

The history of Samson and of Dalla Is, It Is claimed, 
also a solar myth : It Is the sun disappearing before the 
night. Samson, the giant, Is the sun : his hair, which 
causes his strength, are Its rays ; his name Shamshon 



256 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

is an alteration of the sun's name, Shemesh. Dalia, 
who attracts him, upon the bosom of whom he sleeps 
and who robs him of his hair, is the night into the bosom 
of which the sun disappears, and which robs him of his 
rays. Dalia is an altered form of Dah-leihah (the 
night). Finally, the temple of the Philistines over- 
thrown b}^ the blind hero, is the temple figured by the 
clouds stopped in the horizon, and penetrated by the 
setting of the sun. The sun withdrawing itself crum- 
bles down and disappears. On account of these anal- 
ogies, they refuse all historic reality to Samson. 



CHAPTER XIX. 



CAIN, CAINITES AND SETHITES. 
Cain 

THE polygenists, in order to deny the unity of man- 
kind or human species, appeal to the .account 
of Genesis (iv, 14), where it is said that Cain was afraid 
that every one that would find him might kill him. 
But, say the Rationalists, when there existed no other 
men but the Adamites, how could Cain, after having 
committed his fraticide, be afraid to be killed by those 
he would meet? We can answer that it was because 
Cain could not ignore that the men would become 
multiplied, and since the remorse of conscience renders 
man suspicious and uneasy, what is there astonishing 
of being afraid, whenever the children of Adam would 
have become more numerous. 

But, continue the infidels, how could Cain build a 
city? What workmen did he have? What citizens 



CAIN, CAINITES AND SETHITES. 257 

to people it? Here one attaches to the word '* city ^' 
a meaning which it does not possess in Genesis (iv, 17.) 
The translators render by " city '"' the Hebrew word 
*/>, because this is the meaning one generally attributes 
to it, but one is much mistaken when he understands 
by the 'ir of Cain a city in the actual sense of the word. 
To show how the difficulties they wished to raise against 
this Biblical episode are without foundation, it is suffi- 
cient to inquire about the real meaning of the Hebrew 
word. Now, behold how Gesenius, a Rationalist him- 
self, explains it. He derives Hr from the verb ' our , '' to 
watch, to oversee," and adds: "This word has a very 
extensive meaning, and applies itself also to fields, forti- 
fications, watchtowers, places under guard. 
In Genesis (iv, 17), we must not understand a whole 
city, no more than a cave, because a cave is not built, 
but a camp of nomads, protected by a ditch or trench 
against the attacks of wild beasts " ('' Thesaurus Hnguse 
hebracae," p. 1005). Cain, therefore, did not build a 
city, properly speaking, but a '' watch-place, or watch- 
house, a place of refuge," in which he beheved himself 
secure against those that might seek his life. Such is 
the true explanation of this passage of Genesis, and it 
is only in abusing the ambiguity of the badly vmder- 
stood word " city " employed in our translations, that 
one can derive from it, either the existence of non- 
Adamic men, or the impossibility or improbability of 
the fact itself. 

CAINITES AND SETHITES. 

A great number of Rationalists maintain that the 
genealogy of the children of Seth and that of the chil- 
dren of Cain (Gen. iv, 17-24 and v, 1-31) are only one 

D. B— 17. 



258 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

genealogy. They pretend that the two genealogical 
tables of the Sethites and of the Cainites had formed 
at first only one, which was divided into two parts, as 
now presented, at quite an early date. The alleged 
proof of this is, that two names are identical in both 
hsts, and several more are similar to each other. It 
is also claimed that the Israelites inserted into their 
sacred writings two traditions of different origin relat- 
ing to the antediluvian patriarchs, the one of which 
considers Elohim- Jehovah as God, and Adam as the 
first man ; the other admitted, they say, the Babylonico- 
Egyptian god Seth, and as first man, Enos ; the de- 
scendants attributed to Adam and to Enos were the 
same, so that the two lists, differing in their origin, were 
identical in their content. 

The statements formulated against the. two genea- 
logical lists of Genesis have been refuted by several 
exegetists and Assyriologists. One thing in connec- 
tion with these rationalistic assertions will occur to any 
thinker not blinded by prejudice, and that is that the 
resemblance which the negative criticism pretends to 
discover in the patriarchal genealogies is purely artifi- 
cial. In that of Seth, from Adam to Noe, we have ten 
generations ; in that of Cain we have only eight. To 
find the same number, Reuss, a Rationalist, suppresses 
Adam and Seth in the Sethite genealogy, although the 
text, names them expressly. Hence, it is only by the 
help of an artifice, contrary to the testimony of Genesis, 
and we can add also, contrary to the Chaldean tradition 
which had equally preserved the list of ten antediluvian 
kings, that one has an equal number. 

But the divergence is not only in the figure of the 
generations, it is also noticeable in the account. 



LONGEVITY OF THE FIRST MAN. 259 

Whatever the summary may be, the differences which 
exist between the two genealogies show that they 
have always been distinct. The one gives particular 
details of Henoch, the other of Lamech, that of the 
Cainites being that of the reprobated by God, does not 
contain the duration of their life ; while, on the other 
hand, that of the Sethites, the elected by God, denotes 
the duration of their life. Thus, there exist more 
differences than resemblances between the two lists : 
there are more names on the one side than on the other ; 
the arrangement is different, and the details are not the 
same in both ; the interpretations of the names, which 
are said to be identical, are distinct. What more is 
needed to establish that these genealogies are not the 
same ? 



CHAPTER XX. 



LONGEVITT OF THE FIRST MAN. 

THE longevity of. the first men, who attained until 
nine hundred and sixty-nine years, has furnished 
quite early material for objections against the historical 
character of Genesis.^ In the first century of our era, 
Josephus makes the attempt in his '' Jewish Antiqui- 



^ Adam lived 939 years; Seth, 912; Enos, 905; Cainan, 910; 
Malaleel, 895 ; Jared, 962 (according to the Samaritan text, 847) ; 
Mathusalem, 969 (Samaritan, 720) ; Lamech, 777 (Samaritan, 653; 
Septuagint, 753) ; Noe, 950. Beginning with Noe the duration of 
life becomes gradually shorter until the time of Moses. 



260 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

ties " to justify the Biblical account. Several Fathers 
of the Church, among others St. Augustine, do the 
same during the centuries following. 

In our days, all the infidels reject the long duration 
of life of the antediluvian men. '' It is difficult to 
believe," says Winer, '' that a man could have lived 
seven hundred to eight hundred years." And Winer 
refuses to accept, not only this longevity, but also the 
different explanations by which they have tried to 
reduce it to about ordinary proportions. Reuss does 
the same. The hypotheses to which he objects are 
the following : Hensler has admitted a year of three 
months from Adam until after the Deluge ; of eight 
months from Adam until Joseph ; of twelve months 
since Joseph. Rask has supposed that until Noe months 
and years were synonyms. According to Lesueur, the 
years of the Septuagint, since the creation of the world 
until Abraham, must be reduced to Chaldean sosses, each 
soss containing sixty days. Other savants have supposed 
that the figures of the genealogies of Genesis did not 
designate the duration of life of each patriarch, but a 
period of civilization. Thus, according to Bunsen, the 
numbers which indicate at what age the family chiefs 
had their eldest sons and how long they lived afterwards, 
are posterior additions, marking cycles ; the primitive 
text marked only the duration of their life, and they 
personified an epoch, so that we must understand that 
they have lived from seven hundred to nine hundred 
years, not by themselves, but by their race, in which 
they survived. Gatterer has maintained an opinion 
which approaches that of Bunsen : he believes that the 
names of the patriarchs designate not persons but 
tribes. 



LONGEVITY OF THE FIRST MAN. 26 1 

All these hypothetical explanations are subject to 
many difficulties. It is possible, undoubtedly, that the 
primitive years were not years like ours, but we cannot 
reduce them to one or six months. St. Augustine had 
already observed with just reason, that Seth having 
engendered at the age of one hundred and five years, 
and Cainan at seventy years, if we were to take the years 
for simple months, would reduce them to the unaccept- 
able number of ten or seven years. ^ The mention of 
the seventh and of the tenth month in the account of 
the Deluge^ shows, besides, that the year was com- 
posed at least of ten months'. The cyclic system, pro- 
posed by Bunsen, and accepted by some Catholics, does 
not cause the same objections, but one can hardly bring 
forward any proofs in its favor. 

Hence, we can admit only, purely and simply, the 
account of Moses. In accord with him, all the ancient 
traditions attribute to the first men a longer life than 
to their descendants. Not only Manetho at the 
Egyptians, Berosus at the Chaldeans, Mochus at the 
Phoenicians, but Hesiod, Hecateus, Hellanicus, Acusi- 
laus, Ephorus and others of the Greeks speak of the 
longevity of the first men. In the Hindoos and 
Chinese, we find traces of an analogous remembrance. 
The Zend-Avesta makes to live Yima, the first man, 
more than thrice three hundred years. It is the same 
in America, where the traditions of the aborigines relate 
that the ancient men lived until their members were 
used up. 

They refuse to admit the longevity of the patriarchs 
in alleging that it is physiologically impossible. But 

^ De Civ. Dei xv, 12, i vol. xlv, col. 450. 
2 Gen. vii, 11, viii, 4-13. 



262 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. . 

is this SO certain? Has actual biological science the 
necessary resources to solve the question with full 
knowledge? This is at least very doubtful. We 
ignore the constitution of the primitive men. So many 
changes in the human organism have produced them- 
selves on account of the formation of the races, the in- 
.fluence of the surrounding, heredity and crossings, that 
these notable changes may have effectively modified the 
duration of life. A savant who has made a special 
study of the question has remarked: '' Nothing in the 
organs, in the functions or properties of the bodies 
indicates what their duration is. . . . It would not 
be at all contrary to reason, nor to the laws of the 
organism that man, under cover from illnesses which 
trouble the harmony, or from exterior violences which 
break the mechanism, would live several centuries. 
The long life of the patriarchs was a more rational fact, 
more in relation with the laws of physiology than the 
short existence of man who peoples the earth to-day."^ 



CHAPTER XXI. 

THE ANTEDILUVIAN GIANTS. 

THE sixth chapter of Genesis relates that '' after men 
began to be multiplied upon the earth, and 
daughters were born to them, the sons of God, bene 
ha-Elohem, seeing the daughters of men, bennot ha- 
ddam, that thev were fair, took to themselves wives of 



' Dr. P. Foissac, *' La Longevite humaine," Paris, 1873, p. 346- 
347. 



THE ANTEDILUVIAN GIANTS. 263 

all which they chose. And God said: My spirit shall 
not remain in man forever, because he is flesh. 
Now, giants, nefelem, were upon the earth in those days. 
For after the sons of God went in to the daughters of 
men, and they brought forth children, these are mighty 
men of old, gibborem, men of renown " (Gen. vi, 1-4). 

This short passage has given rise to numerous 
objections. It contains obscure allusions. Who were 
the sons of God and the daughters of men? Who 
were the nefelem and the gibborem ? 

The nefelem, according to the common interpreta- 
tion, were giants, although the root of this w^ord ndfal, 
to fall, renders its etymology difficult to explain. Their 
name is, therefore, mysterious; as to their history, it 
is quite unknown. vScripture, which alone could give 
us an accoimt of them, teaches us nothing except their 
name. It does not even tell us anything of their gen- 
ealogy. It is repeatedly aflirmed that they were off- 
springs from the union of the sons of God with the 
daughters of men, but the text does not say so. We 
read only therein that '' there were giants upon the 
earth," and that after the sons of God had united them- 
selves with the daughters of man, they brought forth 
gibborem. This latter word has been rendered like 
nefelem,, as giants, in the version of the Septuagint; it 
is, however, very different from it, and implies solely 
the idea of force, not of high stature. The original 
text establishes no direct genealogy between nefelem 
and gibborem; nothing proves that there existed two 
species of nefelem (giants), those which have preceded 
the marriage of the sons of God with the daughters of 
man, and those which have been the fruit thereof. 
Hence, the Rationalists may state whatever they pleas^ 



264 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

in regard to this subject; we are not called upon to de- 
fend the Bible in subjects of which it does not speak. 

In regard to the existence of giants, many ancient 
traditions have preserved the remembrance thereof. 
The Assyrian monuments represent frequently the hero 
Izdubar. The Titans are famous in Greek mythology. 
India, Persia and Germania have traditions of primitive 
giants. The Mexicans relate that in the second age, 
Tlaltoniatuh, or age of the earth, giants were anni- 
hilated by a catastrophe which overwhelmed the world. 
According to the Peruvians, in ages past giants invaded 
their country who became guilty of all kinds of crimes, 
and who were punished by death on account of their 
immoraHtv. 



CHAPTER XXII. 



THE SONS OF GOD AND THE DA UGHTERS OF MAN. 

TtlE infidel critics, and a great number of Protestant 
writers, maintain that ''the sons of God" who took 
into marriage the daughters of men, were no other 
than angels, and from this they conclude that we have 
to do here with a fable. They can allege in favor, not 
of their conclusion but of their interpretation, the tes- 
timony of a certain number of Fathers of the Church, 
and several did not fail to take advantage of them. 

Indeed, we acknowledge that Jewish and Christian 
interpreters have believed that the sons of God were 
angels. But those Fathers and ancient ecclesiastical 
writers, who, by the sons of God, have understood the 



THE SONS OF GOD AND THE DAUGHTERS OF MAN. 265 

angels, have been led into error through the wrong 
opinion which they had about the nature of the celestial 
spirits, to whom they attributed a body like ours, and 
through the unjustified belief in the apocryphal Book 
of Henoch, which made them forget the saying of our 
Saviour that the -angels do not marry (Matt, xxii, 30). 
The infidels pretend, it is true, that we must not be sur- 
prised when the first Christians have beheved in the 
reveries of the Book of Henoch, because, according to 
them, the Apostle St. Jude also believed therein, and 
thereby taught the faithful in his Epistle to venerate 
this fabulous writing as the word of God. These con- 
sequences do not flow at all from the words of St. Jude, 
and it is even uncertain whether the Apostle knew of 
this apocryphal writing. But supposing that it was 
known to him, even supposing that he quoted the same, 
his quotation would prove in no manner that he believed 
that the sons of God were angels. Henoch has proph- 
esied: " Behold, the Lord cometh with thousands of His 
saints to execute judgment upon all."^ Such are the 
expressions of St. Jude. He may have borrowed this 
prophecy from tradition, not from a v/ritten text ; but, 
however this may be, his language contains no allusion 
to the question we treat here, and in no manner can 
one allege his testimony in favor of Lactantius and 
Tertullian, who attributed to the angels a body like 
ours. Even supposing that he would have praised the 



^ Jude 14-15. Cf. Henoch, i, 9, The Book of Henoch relates 
that certain angels, sent by God to guard the earth, were smitten by 
the beauty of the daughters of men, taught them witchcraft and 
finery, lumina lapillorum, circulos ex auro, as Tertullian expresses 
himself, and, being banished from heaven, had sons three thousand 
cubits high and gave birth to a race of celestial and terrestrial 
demons. 



266 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Book of Henoch, because it contains a true fact, it 
would not follow at all that he approved all that is con- 
tained in this apocryphal writing. 

Besides the pretended testimony of St. Jude, the 
infidels make appeal to another argument, which they 
borrow from philology. The bene Elohim, or sons of 
God, they tell us, designate the angels in Job and in 
the Psalms,^ therefore, also the sons of God in Genesis 
are angels. 

Because the expression bene Elohim signifies the 
angels in the poetic Books of Job and of the Psalms, 
it does not follow that it has also this meaning in the 
Pentateuch. Never, neither in the Pentateuch, nor in 
any other writing in prose of the Old Testament, are 
the angels called sons of God, although there is often 
question about them; but they are always named mes- 
sengers of God, male'ak.'^ If, therefore, Moses would 
have Avished to speak of angels in chapter six of Genesis, 
he would have designated them under the name of 
male aMn. By the sons of God he would understand 
those who have remained faithful to God, as also by the 
daughters of man, he understands those who abandoned 
themselves to human passions. The expression itself 
designates simply creatures of God, made to his image; 
hence, it does not become less to men than to the angels; 
also the men are called sons of the Most High, in the 
Psalms; sons of Jehovah, their Elohim, in Deuteron- 
omy; sons of the living God, in the prophet Osee 
(Ps^ 8i). 

Let us note one point more in ending these observa- 



^ Job. I, 6; ii, I ; xxxvii, 7; Ps. xxix, i; Ixxix, 7 (Hebrew). 
^ Gen. xvi, 7; xix, i ; xxiv. 7, 40; xxviii, 12; xlviii, 16; E. xxiii, 
20, etc. 



THE NOACHIAN DELUGE. 267 

tions. It is worthy of remark that Genesis does not 
reproach the antediluvian men with acts of idolatry, but 
only of their immorality. There is no trace of idolatry, 
nor of false gods before the Deluge, which is a mark of 
antiquity and of authenticity. The author of the 
Pentateuch and of the prophets would not have failed 
to reproach their impiety to the great criminals who 
perished in the Deluge, had they been guilty thereof, 
for their chastisement would have served as example 
to the inspired writers in their objurgations against 
the idolatrv of their times. 



CHAPTER XXIIL 



THE NOACHIAN DELUGE. 

i-T^HE sixth, seventh and eighth chapters of Genesis 
1 are occupied with the story of the great Flood 
which destroyed the whole human race, save only eight 
souls in Noe's family. The Flood, which is described 
as overstepping the highest mountains, is made to 
appear as an extraordinary manifestation of God's ven- 
geance on the human race for its wickedness. The 
account is in some respects peculiar. -It is surprisingly 
diffuse, and abounds in repetitions — the same fact 
being stated and restated in different words. In chap- 
ter six God's action is declared to be due to the univer- 
sal wickedness of mankind, and Noe and his family are 
said to be spared in reward of their righteous conduct 
in the midst of universal corruption. Then Noe is 



268 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

charged to build the ark, and to take into it two ani- 
males of each kind. In sixth chapter, Noe is ordered to 
enter the ark, and take therein seven pairs of clean, and 
two of unclean beasts, and also of the fowls of the air, 
seven and seven, male and female. The execution of 
the order is then related, and it is noteworthy that two 
pairs of both clean and unclean animals entered the 
ark. This fact of the animals and Noe entering the 
ark is again mentioned when the Flood burst forth. 
That this is an additional narrative, such as was usual 
with Semitic writers, appears from the use of the plu- 
perfect. At length the waters of the swollen Flood 
rose to their full height, overtopping the highest 
mountains by fifteen yards, and destroying all living 
creatures under heaven. In forty days the Flood reached 
its height, and for one hundred and fifty days it so stood. 
Chapter eight describes the end of the Flood. One hun- 
dred and fifty days after the Flood began, the ark rested 
on Mt. Ararat, and seventy-three days later the tops of 
the mountains came in sight. Fort}^ days after, Noe sent 
forth a raven, and on every seventh day he thrice sent 
forth a dove. On removing the covering from the ark, 
he saw that the surface of the earth was drying; but 
fifty-seven days more elapsed before it was quite dry. 
At length God bade him quit the ark, in which he had 
abode one year and ten days — whether a solar or 
lunar year is not clear, but probably, according to the 
latest Hebrew calculations, the latter. Absolute ac- 
curacy in regard to numbers is hardly possible. 

2. Fortunately, as in the case of Creation and the 
Fall, Ave possess, independently of the Bible, an account 
of the Deluge in the cuneiform inscriptions, which shed 
a fiood of light on Genesis. The lay tablets are, it is 



THE NOACHIAN DELUGE. 269 

true, only copies from the seventh century B. C; but 
the origmals are pronounced by competent critics to 
be as old as the year 2000 B. C. The two accounts are 
of such a kind that they must have been drawn from 
different sources. In the Chaldean story which Abra- 
ham had brought with him from his own home, Noe 
is >vrongly represented to have been near the sea (Per- 
sian Gulf), whereas Genesis and the ark presuppose 
the mainland. The Chaldean, also, would seem to have 
been conversant with two narratives, for he records the 
two episodes in Genesis vii, 16, with the difference, that 
it is Hasisadra and not God who shuts the door of the 
ark (ship). The Chaldean legend also bears traces of 
two passages at the end of chapter eight, and the begin- 
ning of chapter nine. It also tells how Hasisadra, after 
landing from the ship, offered acceptable sacrifice to 
the gods; wherefore they loaded him with favors. Nor 
is mention wanting of the three birds sent out in succes- 
sion. External confirmation such as this is more 
valuable than myriads of external arguments, such as 
Jeovistic and Elohistic passages pointed out by the 
Rationalists, and shows conclusively that the story told 
in Genesis is not a subsequent fortuitous compilation 
from unknown documents. Moses learned the points 
of the story, and handed them intact and unaltered. In 
reading the Biblical story we are struck, not by the 
blending into one of two narratives, but by the lofty 
design, the moral theology that pervades it. In this, 
indeed, the finger of God is manifest. 

3. Other traditions concerning the Flood need not 
here occupy our attention. They are to be found in 
almost all nations, especially among the Americans. 
" The tradition concerning the Flood," says Lenor- 



2/0 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

mant, *^ is the universal tradition par excellence among 
all nations that have preserved the memory of the his- 
tory of the primitive man." 

4. The question as to the universality of the Deluge 
may be regarded from three points of view: in relation 
to the earth, to animals, and to man. Nowadays there 
can be no manner of doubt that the Flood did not over- 
spread the whole earth. The old view now numbers 
adherents only among those who willfully shut their 
eyes to all collateral knowledge, and blindly put their 
trust in the literal sense of the text. An inundation 
of the whole earth to the tops of the highest mountains 
would require a volume of water so immense as to 
defy calculation. First of all, imagine a zone of nine 
or ten thousand metres in diameter girding the earth; 
then compare it with the sea, which has a mean depth 
of from two to three thousand metres; this will give 
some idea of the mass and weight of water required. 
It would require some twenty figures to express 
the number of cubic metres. This mass would have 
collected as quickly as it dispersed. To exclude the 
peaks of the tlimalayas and Cordilleras because, being 
covered with eternal snow, they could afford no shelter 
to the animals, is to abandon the letter and to concede 
in principle the right to explain the text otherwise. 
The physical difficulties involved in a partial inundation 
that covered Mt. y\rarat, a height of five thousa'nd 
metres (if this mount, and not the whole mountain chain, 
may be exegetically considered the resting place of the 
ark), are, considering the configuration of Central Asia, 
far less for the inundation of the whole earth. Modern 
pala:ontology supplies many instances of the sea cover- 
ing mountain ranges, and depositing animal remains at 



THE NOACHIAN DELUGE. 2/1 

the height of four thousand or five thousand metres. 
Hence, a partial Flood presents no difficulties. 

By the story as told in Genesis we are not irredeem- 
ably pledged to this universality. The waters, it is said, 
inundated the earth, destroyed all things on the earth's 
surface, and submerged all the high mountains under 
heaven. But it argues a very imperfect understanding 
of the manner of speech adopted in Holy Scripture, to 
imagine that the sense is bounded by the letter. Natur- 
ally this interpretation was upheld until the catastrophe 
was looked at from its physical side. But once the 
question is viewed from a scientific standpoint, it be- 
comes imperatively necessary to examine how far this 
explanation is a necessity. A little study of' the Holy 
Scripture soon makes it clear that the sacred writers 
understood by '' the earth," " the whole earth," the 
country in which they or their informant happened to 
be (Deut. ii, 25; iv, 19). Palestine is the whole earth, 
and Jerusalem the center of the world. Semitic writers 
delight in rhetorical generalizations (Cf. Gen. xli, 54, 
57; 3 Kings X, 23-24; Mat. xii, 42; Is. xiv, 7, 26; Jer. 
iv, 23 ff. ; XV, 10; Acts ii, 5), in magnifying the part into 
the whole. Many is put for all, all stands for many. 
From the informant's standpoint all seemed inundated; 
and we are perfectly justified in viewing these expres- 
sions from his standpoint. Nor do we thereby detract 
from God's wonderful work. For the waters of the 
deep, and the floodgates of heaven (i. e. the waters of 
the ocean, on which the land rested, from the earth's 
cavities, and from the clouds above) form so immense 
a volume that their aggregation for the purpose of 
inundation cannot have been a mere natural event, even 
if terrific waterspouts and tempests, with earthquakes 



272 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

and volcanic phenomena to boot, be dragged in as aux- 
iliary forces. 

5. How does the case stand in regard to animals. 
As to their fate the Bible seems to leave no loophole 
for doubt. '' Every beast according to its kind," says 
Genesis, ^' and all the earth in their kind, and every- 
thing that moveth upon the earth according to its kind; 
and every fowl according to its kind, all birds and all 
that fly, went in to Noe into the ark, two and two of 
all flesh." 

This passage was understood to refer to all animals, 
known and unknown, instead of referring to the animals 
known at the time of the Deluge. Thus, it becomes 
very difficult to explain, without multiplying miracles, 
how Noe could gather into the ark animals which were 
separated from him by the immense ocean, and how ani- 
mals living, perhaps, on islands could return there after 
the inundation. The Deluge being, according to the 
Bible, a punishment for the sins of mankind, it follows 
that all men should perish in order to atone for their 
sins; but this was not true of the animals; hence there 
was no reason why they also should perish. Now, just 
as it is conformable to the rules of good criticism to un- 
derstand by the '' whole earth " the earth known at the 
time, it is equally correct to understand by '' all the 
animals " only those which were known to Noe and 
Moses. Hence, we must admit that only those animals 
perished which were known to him at that time. These 
which Noe did not know, did not exist for him. We 
have no reason to suppose that God revealed super- 
naturally to Noe the existence of animals which he 
never had occasion to see, and of which he had never 
heard. Neither does anything .prove that God ordered 



THE NOACHIAN DELUGE. 2/3 

him to gather others than those which lived in his own 
country. 

6. A less confident tone is, perhaps, becoming in 
discussing the partial character of the Flood in its 
effects on the human race. Genesis declares over and 
over again that the eight souls in Noe's family were 
alone saved. The legends, too, attest its universality. 
The Fijians have a tradition that eight, the Aztecs, that 
one or two survived. Deucalion and Pyrrha, according 
to the Greek tradition, Manu, according to the Indian, 
were the sole survivors. The very claim of being au- 
tochtonous implies this version. Is it, then, permissi- 
ble to look at this part of the story from the narrow 
standpoint of the eyewitness, which the narrator has 
made his own? From the partial destruction of the 
brute creation, may we infer a partial destruction of the 
human race? It seems to be a natural inference, 
since the animals were punished on man's account. 
Such a solution would greatly simplify the difficulties, 
on which we have already touched as to the age of the 
human race (See Chronology) and which we have 
studied already. The absence of all tradition in Africa 
concerning the Flood seems to give strength to this 
supposition. In our days there are ethnographers, 
philologists, and palaeontologists who hold either that 
the Flood affected human life only in its center, or that 
the Negroes were exempt, or that some only, probably 
the descendants of Seth, were destroyed. Harlez is 
not unfavorably disposed to this opinion, and the Jesuits, 
Bellynck and Delsaux, consider it, to say the least, 
compatible with faith. In favor of this opinion it is 
claimed that, according to Moses, the Cainites had long 
since gone forth from the land of Nod to settle in more 

D. B.— 18. 



274 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

distant countries; that only Noachians were enumerated 
in Moses' table of peoples; that there were none but 
Semitics at Babel; hence, that none but the Sethites 
were destroyed. But, even critical questions aside, 
these are caverns too darksome to be ever exposed to 
the full light of day. Nor do Acts xxvii,26, and Romans 
v, 12, tell against this position. The Apostle is merely 
teaching that the human race is one in descent; the 
Deluge he does not even mention. — The question be- 
comes more complicated in dealing with passages in the 
New Testament that contain a special reference to the 
Flood. In Luke xvii, 2y, Jesus compares the time of 
His second coming with the time of Noe. Noe's con- 
temporaries tossed all w^arnings to the winds, and lived 
jauntily and heedlessly until the Flood came and de- 
stroyed all. The same expression occurs in the parallel 
verse 29, which narrates the destruction of all the 
people of Sodom, save Loth. In both cases the '' all " 
must, it seems, be constructed literally. In I Peter 
iii, 20, it is distinctly said that eight souls were saved 
by water: '' In the ark (of Noe) few, eight souls, were 
saved by water." " God preserved Noe, the eighth 
person, the preacher of justice " (2 Peter ii, 5). The 
unanimous tradition and the universal teaching of the 
theologians, interpret these words of St. Peter in the 
sense that only eight persons w^ere saved i. e.: Noe, 
his wife, his three sons, and their wives. No sufficient 
reason is given for departing from the interpretation 
accepted by the Church until at present. The formation 
of the various human races, and the numerous lan- 
guages spoken upon earth in dim antiquity, the prog- 
ress of civilization had made long before Abraham, we 
are told, are so many proofs that some races escaped the 



ETHNOGRAPHIC TABLE. 275 

Deluge and preserved their characteristic features, lan- 
guage and arts. The supporters of this opinion suppose 
that a relatively short time elapsed between the Deluge 
and Abraham, but in the treatise on Biblical Chronol- 
ogy it can be seen that very probably this time is longer 
than was generally supposed. 



CHAPTER XXIV. 



ETHNOGRAPHIC TABLE; OR, DISPERSION OF THE 
NA TIONS. 

BEFORE circumscribing definitely its historic 
structure, in order to speak only of his race, 
Moses casts a general glance on the families issued 
from Noe, and draws a great picture, which the Ration- 
aUsts themselves cannot help admiring. The tenth 
chapter of Genesis is not only a geographical table of the 
nations; but it is also an ethnographic tableau, or more 
correctly '' ethnogenic," because it contains a genea- 
logical and linguistic tree. However, it is not complete 
in its details. 

The world which it describes, when one considers 
only the nations mentioned, without paying attention 
to their ramifications, is bounded on the north by the 
Black Sea, and by the mountains of Armenia; to the 
east, it extends scarcely beyond the shores of the Tigris; 
to the south, it reaches the Persian Gulf, embracing 
Arabia and the Red Sea, and enters into Abyssinia in 
passing through Egypt; in the west, it embraces the 
oriental islands of the Mediterranean. Moses did not 
desire to give a complete picture of the universe, nor 



2']6 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

the genealogy of all the peoples issued from Noe; he has 
depicted only those which it was most important for the 
history of religion and of revelation. 

The exactitude of the teachings contained in the 
tenth chapter of Genesis is generally admitted. The 
critics are divided only as to the time in which the events 
occurred. Francois Lenormant makes the following 
reflections on the subject: '' It is the most ancient, the 
most precious and the most complete document about 
the distribution of the peoples in the world of the most 
remote antiquity. One has even the right to consider 
it anterior to the epoch of Moses, for it presents a state 
of nations which the Egyptian monuments show us 
already changed on several points in the epoch of the 
exodus. Moreover, the enumeration therein is made 
in a regular geographical order around a center which 
is Babylonia and Chaldea,not Egypt or Palestine. It is, 
therefore, probable that this tableau of the nations and 
of their origin forms part of the remembrances which 
the family of Abraham had brought along from Chaldea, 
and that it represents the distribution of the peoples 
known in the civilized world at the moment when the 
patriarch left the shores of the Euphrates, that is, two 
thousand years before the Christian era " ('' Hist, 
ancienne de I'Orient," vol. iii, p. 15). 

Objection is made to the exactitude of the ethno- 
graphic table of Genesis, where the Phoenicians are 
ranked among the Chamites, when they were, in reality, 
a Semitic people, spoke a purely Semitic idiom, and 
differed but Uttle from the Hebrews. It is true that 
the Phoenicians spoke the Semitic language, but it can- 
not be concluded from this that they were not Chanaan- 
ites. There are peoples in Europe who speak a Roman- 



ETHNOGRAPHIC TABLE. ' 2 77 

ish language, derived from the Latin language, who, 
nevertheless, do not descend from the Latins. 

It is a known fact that the Phoenicians of Palestine 
came, as Herodotus expressly testifies (ii, 89), from the 
Erythrean Sea, and consequently from a Cushite coun- 
try. When later on we behold them speaking a Semitic 
language, it proves that they, like other peoples coming 
in contact with greater or more numerous races, met 
and mingled with the Semitics, and ended in being 
absorbed by them. 

As to the dispersion of the Semitics, the opinion 
most generally received until lately is that the Semitics, 
after the Deluge, dwelt first in Armenia. But in what 
place did they separate to form different nations? Gen- 
esis, according to the universal interpretation of the 
narrative of the Tower of Babel, tells us that it was in 
the plain of Sennaar. Some modern savants object, 
at least indirectly, to this assertion, which, they claim, 
places the cradle of the Semitics in Arabia. Although 
it can be maintained that this opinion is not absolutely 
in contradiction with Genesis, because the Semitics 
could have at first settled down in the Arabic peninsula, 
and because the family of Abraham might have gone up 
afterwards from here to Ur in Chaldea, the natural sense 
of the text is little in accord with this theory. For a 
long time it was believed that all mankind had been 
gathered in the plains of Sennaar, during the epoch of 
the building of the Tower of Babel. To-day the exe- 
getists admit quite willingly that there were only the 
descendants of Sem, at least the majority of them. The 
posterity of Noe had, indeed, become too multiplied in 
this epoch since the time of the Deluge, as to be en- 
abled to keep itself entirely in the Babylonian plain. 



278 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Egypt was peopled for too long a time before Abraham 
to make it possible to suppose that there were not yet 
many inhabitants in the Nile valley, a few generations 
previous to Abraham, etc. The most of the arguments 
produced in favor of the antiquity in regard to man 
may be applied in the present case. Finally, the lan- 
guage of Moses refers only to the race of Sem. Hence, 
it is only according to this interpretation that we have 
to justify it. 

The historic documents in existence do not furnish 
direct proof that all the Semitics lived together in the 
Babylonian plain, but philological research furnishes 
the means by which this fact is indirectly estabUshed. 
Although the means may not always appear peremptory, 
they are of so much more value in the present question, 
since the adversaries cannot allege any others to contro- 
vert them: they contest the exactitude of the inspired 
account in the name of the linguistics; we will answer 
them in the name of this same science. 

First let us remark, that we can divide the Semitics 
into two groups: the southern group, comprising the 
Arabs, the Himyarites and the Ethiopians or Abyssin- 
ians, and the northern group, to which belong the 
Chaldeo-Assyrians, the Chanaanites, the Israelites, and 
the Arameans or Syrians. They are distinguished 
from one another not only by location, but also by 
various peculiarities of language, and by certain religious 
traditions. From this it follows that the Chaldeo- 
Assyrians, the Hebrews and the Arameans descend 
from ancestors who, after having separated from the 
Arabs and the Ethiopians, have continued to live 
together until the present day. But anteriorly, the 
Semitics of the north and those of the south formed 



ETHNOGRAPHIC TABLE. 2/9 

only one people. From the testimony of all the Orient- 
aUsts without exception, all the so-called Semitic lan- 
guages, the Hebrew, the Assyrian, the Aramean, the 
Ethiopian and the x\rabic are only so many branches 
from the same stem; in fact, the vocabulary and the 
grammar are about the same; the triliteral roots and 
the principal grammatical flections are identical. 

The most of the Semitists are also agreed that the 
Arab language approaches nearest the primitive lan- 
guage of the children of Sem; but some of these 
authorities, going still further, Avish to conclude from 
this that the Arabs present the most pure type of the 
primitive Semitic, in their language, morals, customs and 
religious ideas. Following the same line of argument, 
the antiquity of the Arabic language proves that Arabia 
is the cradle of the Semitic race. It was from the north 
of Arabia, they say, or from Central Arabia, that all 
the Semitics spread: the Ethiopians and the Sabeans 
went towards the south, the Babylonians and the Ara- 
means or Syrians towards the north. 

They have recourse to more serious arguments than 
to such vague analogies. They maintain, in the first 
place, that the Chaldeans of Armenia are the same 
people as the Chalybes, and that they have nothing in 
common with the Semitics. This particular point 
matters little. The second part of their thesis, namely, 
that all the Semitics came from Arabia, is more impor- 
tant. The proof they give for this last assertion consists, 
as we have already remarked, in the claim that the 
Arabic language approaches most closely the Semitic 
mother tongue. It is there, they say, where the primi- 
tive type has best preserved itself, that we mu.st seek the 
cradle of the race. 



280 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

To this we answer that the conclusion is not legiti- 
mate. The Sanscrit and the Greek, among the Aryan 
languages, are those which approach nearest the primi- 
tive Indo-European language; nobody, however, thinks 
about concluding from this that India or Greece is the 
primitive cradle of the Aryans. The preservation of 
the Arab dictionary, and particularly of the grammar, 
in a relatively greater purity and integrity than those 
of the other Semitic idioms, explains itself easily through 
the geographical situation of Arabia. This peninsula, 
isolated from the rest of the world by surrounding seas 
and deserts, had little communication with the nations, 
so that the contact with foreign races was not sufficient 
to change its language. 

Hence, it is logical to assert, from the peculiarity of 
the Arabian tongue, that the ancestors of those who 
speak it settled quite early in the peninsula, before the 
Semitic idioms had obtained the distinctive features 
which we remark in them to-day. On the other hand, 
the Babylonians and the Assyrians, modified their forms 
of speech, adopting the idioms of the foreign tongues, 
under the influence of the surrounding nations with 
whom they were in relation. The Arabs, living alone, 
faithfully retained their language like their morals and 
customs, so that the documents which we possess in 
language, although they date only from the sixth cen- 
tury of our era, approach more closely the language 
of the children of Sem than any other Semitic document 
and even more than the Assyrian documents, anterior 
to them by more than two thousand years. 

Mr. vSchrader has made an attempt, but without suc- 
cess, to dispute this explanation. If this were estab- 
lished, he says, the Arabs, in traveling from the cradle 



ETHNOGRAPHIC TABLE. 28 1 

of their race into Arabia, should have modified their 
primitive characteristics, Hke the other Semitics, by 
coming into contact with the nations which they met 
on their route, in going towards the west or into the 
south. 

We can show that this reasoning is not well founded. 
The Sabeans who established a great kingdom, had 
commercial relations with the other nations; the Ethio- 
pians who passed from southern Arabia into Africa, 
modified themselves, indeed, and had a particular lan- 
guage. The Arabs of the north and of the center of 
the peninsula preserved intact their idiom and mode 
of life, imported from elsewhere, thanks to the little 
traveling they engaged in, and the isolation in which 
they lived. By immigrating from the shores of the 
Euphrates and Tigris into their new country, they had 
crossed a desert, and it is only necessary to refer to a 
map, to become convinced that they had only a short 
voyage to accomplish, and that they met too few 
strangers on their route to exercise upon them a sensi- 
ble influence. 

But it is not sufficient to refute the assertion of 
those who pretend to place the cradle of the Semitics 
into Arabia; we have to establish by positive argu- 
ments the fallacy of their statements. 

With the help of philology we dispute the opinion 
which makes Arabia the cradle of the Semitics. By 
comparing the different Semitic languages, one can 
arrive to determine in the principal traits, the flora 
and fauna of the country which the Semitic race in- 
habited, before the separation of its different branches. 
In order that these could give to plants and animals 
the same name, they must have known these plants 



282 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

and animals in the countries where their fathers dwelled 
together. As to the names which differ in the diverse 
languages, they must be of posterior date: they have 
been borrowed in another time and in another country. 

These philological premises presented are incontest- 
able in the eyes of all the linguists. The Semitic lan- 
guages, by comparative study, prove that Arabia is not 
the cradle of those who speak them. Indeed, all the 
languages give the same name to the camel, which con- 
sequently was known before the separation; on the con- 
trary, they call the ostrich differently one from another. 
Therefore, the first Semitics did not live in Arabia, for 
the ostrich is a native of this country. The Arameans 
alone call the ostrich neama, according to the Arab 
ndam, but they have borrowed this name from the 
Arabs, whose caravans coming from Mecca, brought 
feathers of this bird into their country. 

The Arabic dictionary contains two other names 
of animals, that of the small jerboa, yarbic, to-day 
jerboa, and that of the lynx, tuffah ; but these quad- 
rupeds which belong particularly to Arabia, have no 
name in the other Semitic languages, whilst the ostrich 
is given another than its Arabic name, at least, in 
Hebrew, wherein this bird is called yd en, yaanah. If 
the Hebrews had emerged primitively from the Arabic 
peninsula, as some suppose, they would never have for- 
gotten the name of the winged animal which they had 
learned to know in their native country, nor would 
they have given it another name. The name of many 
other animals furnishes analogous arguments. 

But when Arabia is not the cradle of the Semitics, 
where then was it? According to some Semitists, fol- 
lowing the opinion current to-day, the race originated 



ETHNOGRAPHIC TABLE. 283 

in Upper Asia, near to the cradle of the Aryans. To 
credit their statements, it was in the Upper-Hauran, in 
the west of Bolortag, on the plateau of Pamir, that the 
first Semitics lived in contact with the Aryans. Start- 
ing from here, and following the great water course, 
particularly the Oxus, they directed their path towards 
the west, passed to the southwest of the Caspian, and 
penetrated, by one of the narrow passes of the Elbouz, 
into the mountains of Media. From there they entered 
into Mesopotamia. 

The first part of the route traced for the Semitic 
journeying is a pure hypothesis. Only one fact can be 
historically established: we first meet with the Semitics 
in Mesopotamia. To maintain the contrary, they appeal 
to the Semitic flora such as the dictionary of their 
language makes it known to us. According to them, 
the Semitic languages give diverse names to the palm 
and the date trees; the most ancient appellation, they 
say, to designate the date tree, dikla, is met among the 
Aramean tribes who lived in the plains of Babylonia. 
This affirmation is not exact. Dikla is not the most 
antique name of the date tree in Semitic, and the Ara- 
means, in the primitive times, did not live in the plains 
of Babylonia; they spoke the Aramean in Babylonia, 
only after the Assyrian had become a dead language, 
a few centuries before Christ. 

The primitive name of the date tree, in the Semitic 
language is tamara, as is proved by the Hebrew taniar, 
which we read in Exodus and Leviticus, and the 
Ethiopian tamart. The ordinary name of this tree in 
Arabic must be recognized in nachl, but tamar is used 
also, and designates especially the date, or in general, a 
fruit, 



284 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

These facts proclaim the original country of the 
palm tree to have been situated in the lowland of 
the upper and middle course of the Euphrates and the 
Tigris, as it was there also where lived the animals 
the names of which we find in the Semitic language, and 
finally, it is in these places that the traditions of the 
Semitics themselves place their cradle, to the west of 
Holvan, in praise of whose palm trees the Persian poets 
have sung; it is there, indeed, that we must locate the 
•primitive home of the descendants of Sem. It was there 
that they were all gathered before becoming dispersed 
to the south and west. 

Besides, we must remark that all we know of the 
primitive flora of the Semitics confirms this conclusion. 
Chaldea does not abound in variegated plants, but 
those vvdiich we can consider as indigenous in the low- 
lands of the Euphrates and Tigris, namely, the many 
species of poplars, the tamarisk and the pomegranate, 
carry, as well as the palm tree, the same name in all the 
Semitic languages. On the contrary, the plants which 
grow in the temperate zones or on the mountains, the 
elm, the ash, the chestnut, the oak, the beech, the pine 
or cedar, either have diverse names in the different 
branches of the Semitic family, or have taken the same 
name only in a relatively recent epoch. Chaldea was a 
real granery of abundance, the barley and the wheat 
yielded wonderful crops. Also, the wheat, barley and 
corn are expressed in the same manner in all the idio'ms 
of the descendants of Sem, as are also the agricultural 
labors, the occupations of pastoral life, hunting and 
fishing. The same can be said of geographical situa- 
tions, instruments, materials and metals. 



CHAPTER XXV. 



THE PATRIARCH ABRAHAM. 

THE objections raised against the Biblical history of 
Abraham, can be reduced to three heads: i. Origin: 
According to Genesis Abraham was born at Ur in 
Chaldea; emigrated to Haran, when God called him 
into the land of Chanaan by promising to him this land 
for his descendants. 

Hitzig, a Rationalist, questions the Biblical record 
of the Patriarch Abraham. According to his state- 
ment the origin of Abraham is purely Hindoo. In 
order to convince ourselves of this it is sufficient to 
compare his name with that of Rama, the Hindoo god, 
and with the Sanscrit Brahman. As to his wife Sara, 
her name reminds us of the nymph Saraju; therefore 
the Bible deceives itself in making Abraham a Semitic: 
consequently his history merits no beUef ; it is a myth. 

This conclusion is not only a hasty, but an erroneous 
one. The name Abraham is so Assyrian or Chaldean, 
that we trace it in the list of the eponyms or magistrates 
of Ninive; furthermore, when we affirm that Abraham 
came from Chaldea, the language and customs which 
he brought with him must have left profound traces 
on his descendants. Now we are in a position to show 
that modern discoveries have established this to such 
a point that these coincidences cannot be attributed 
to chance, and sufficient to prove a common origin 
between the two peoples — the Hebrew and the Assyr- 
ian. 

(285) 



286 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Let US briefly sum up these relations: i. The Hebrew 
dictionary is almost the same as that of the Assyrian, 
at least for meaning of names which express ideas 
necessarily known in Abraham's time. God is called 
Ilu in Assyrian, and El in Hebrew. There are words 
in both languages almost identical, which designate the 
relations of family (father, mother, etc.); geographical 
terms (sea, river, star, etc.); members of the human 
body (head, eye, mouth, etc.); arms (arrow, lance, etc); 
metals, animals, etc. Moreover, we find other names, 
Hke those of fermented liquors, numbers, measures and 
calendar, which, by their similitude in both languages, 
show beyond doubt that the Hebrew civiHzation, out- 
side its divine element, is only a detached branch of 
the Chaldic civilization. 2. The grammar of both 
languages is also the same. When Abraham left Meso- 
potamia the language had already arrived to its flec- 
tional period, and like all the Semitic languages 
had taken its definite imprint; consequently, we 
must be able to recover between the two grammars 
Assyrian and Hebrew features of resemblance numerous 
enough to permit a conclusion to a common origin. 
This has taken place in quite a remarkable manner. 

We find here not only the general characters of the 
Assyrian are found in the Hebrew, but also the scarcity 
of abstract terms, poverty of the particles, poverty of 
the tenses and moods in the verbs, richness of form 
to explain in one verb the activity, passivity, causality, 
intensity, etc.; but we also discover therein ties of more 
direct relationship. We will mention a few examples: 
the personal, possessive or demonstrative pronouns 
are alike; rules of the formation of the gender, and the 
number of substantives are the same; similitude of the 



THE PATRIARCH ABRAHAM. 287 

verbs and participles, seen in the verse recently recov- 
ered in Assyrian; the paralellism and even, certain rhym. 
Finally what completes the demonstration is that 
some Hebrew idioms, inexplicable for a long time, are 
now readily explained, thanks to the better knowledge 
of the Assyrian. Thus eleven is in Hebrew asteasar; 
but when one knew that 'asarah signified ten, we com- 
pletely ignored the meaning of aste. Now the Assyr- 
ian explains the mystery: 'aste or estin means one, and 
the Hebrew word signifies one and ten. 

Although the close affinity of the two languages 
as exemplified here is not exclusive to both, for one 
can make a certain number with other Semitic 
idioms; it is certain, however, that no two languages are 
more intimately connected than the Assyrian and 
Hebrew. Besides this, when we compare the results 
obtained with the far-fetched etymology of Hitzig, one 
can easily see on which side the truth is. For more 
details see Guinie, '' Lettres de quelques Juifs," 1827, 
vol. H., p. 346; Vigouroux, '' La Bible et les Decouver- 
tes Modernes," vol. I.; Delitzsch, "The Hebrew 
Language Viewed in the Light of Assyrian Research:" 
Opert. '' Grammaire Assyrienne." 

2. ABRAHAM'S JOURNEY TO EGYPT. 

The twelfth chapter of Genesis relates that the 
famine caused Abraham to descend into Egypt . Almost 
all the circumstances of this account have been ques- 
tioned by rationalists. 

I. Before entering Egypt Abraham, fearing that his 
wife's beauty might cause his death, advised her to tell 
that she was his sister. This precaution has been made 
use of to calumniate the character of the patriarch, but 



288 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

it is of itself proof that the episode is authentic, and 
has no foundation in myth. Moreover, it is true Sara 
was a near relative of Abraham, as Genesis relates 
(xx, 12). In the Oriental languages one employs the 
words brother and sister to indicate in a general sense 
near relationship; therefore, when Abraham did not 
tell the whole truth, he at least did not tell a He. 

2. Once in Egypt Sara is taken by Pharaoh. Abra- 
ham on her account was the recipient of marked favors. 
Pharaoh gave him numerous presents, among which 
were sheep, oxen, asses and camels. These gifts have 
served the rationalistic critic pretexts for attacks on the 
Bible, though modern research has verified the account. 

There is nothing singular in this episode, as it is well 
known that the kings of Egypt, as well as those of other 
Oriental countries, have reserved the right to select or 
even force unmarried women to become inmates of their 
harems. Doubtless Pharaoh had many subordinate 
women in addition to his regular wives. A case in 
point has been brought to light by the evidence of an 
Egyptian papyrus which relates: A workingman had 
his ass taken away by an inspector; he reclaims it, and 
the case is taken before the Pharaoh who, after an inves- 
tigation, decided in these terms: ''He answers to nothing 
what one tells him. . . . Let them make a report to 
us by writing . . . his wife and children shall belong 
to the king. . . . Thou shalt give them bread." 
Is this not a case analogous to that of Abraham? 

Again, it is asked: How could a Semitic like Abraham 
receive such a reception at the court of Pharaoh, and 
especially from a Chamite Pharaoh? This is another 
frivolous objection. Two Egyptian monuments have 
been brought to light which refute this and confirm the 



THE PATRIARCH ABRAHAM. 289 

Biblical record: i. On a tomb is found represented the 
arrival into Egypt of Amu-nomads (of Arabia or Pales- 
tine), their chief calls himself Abschah (name analogous 
to that of Abraham); it is the famine that drove them 
into Egypt, and they are received with solemnity by the 
governor. 2. A papyrus preserved to us contains the 
curious history of Sineh: Amu or Egyptian, he enters 
the service of Pharaoh and was raised to high dignity; 
he fled, remains in Palestine for a long time, then re- 
turns, reenters into favor, and becomes counselor of 
the king with precedence over all courtiers. One can 
see the coincidence of the two accounts with the Bib- 
lical one. 

But the chief points of attack are made on the 
presents which Abraham had received. " Behold," 
says Bohlen, " how the author of this account plays 
unfortunate; the horses were very abundant in Egypt, 
and he does not name them among the animals given to 
Abraham; in revenge the author quotes the sheep 
and the camels, very rare however in Egypt, and the 
asses one could not suffer there. How can we admit as 
authentic an account so full of errors?" 

This is really a bold statement, independent of its 
recklessness, for the details of the sacred writer are 
borne out by historical facts. Sheep have already been 
represented on the monuments of the twelfth dynasty. 
We behold thereon, among other things, an inscription 
of three thousand two hundred and eight sheep, attrib- 
uted to a sole proprietor. Of oxen, the geological 
diggings In the delta have brought to light from great 
depths their bones, and, according to the inscriptions, 
have served the same purposes as they do at present. 
From the times of the shepherd kings, the Idolatry 
D. B.— iQ 



290 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

which the Egyptian priests taught the people was of 
a gross kind. Apis was worshipped in the form of an 
ox. Isis in that of a cow, and the history of the wor- 
ship of the golden calf is familiar to every student. 
Asses are represented by herds on the tombs of the 
pyramids, the inscriptions attribute as many as seven 
hundred and sixty of these animals to one proprietor. 
Asses are also represented on the monuments of the 
fifth dynasty. About the camels — it is true, they are 
little represented on the monuments, but one cannot 
conclude from this that they were unknown to the early 
Egyptians, i. Certain rules hindred the artists from 
representing certain animals, for instance, chickens and 
cats; a similar custom may have prevailed regarding 
camels. 2. It is certain camels were in Egypt at the time 
of the Ptolemies, though we do not see them on the 
monuments of that epoch. It might have been the same 
in preceding centuries. 3. The Arabs have employed 
camels from an early day, and surely their neighbors of 
Egypt must have known the use of these '' ships of the 
desert," before the introduction of horses. 4. Some 
texts clearly prove that Egypt employed camels at an 
early epoch, and even taught them to dance. Salman- 
asar (in 857) quotes camels among the tributes paid 
by Egypt. 5. Finally, the geological diggings have un- 
earthed bones from great depths, w^hich belonged to 
dromedaries. The whole of these testimonies is so 
categorical that Chabas retracted his former attacks on 
the Bible. 

The omission of horses which Bohlen criticises so 
triumphantly, is easily accounted for. Horses were 
introduced into Egypt only at the time of the Invasion 
of the Hyksos, and appear In the hieroglyphics of that 



THE PATRIARCH ABRAHAM. 29 1 

epoch — the eighteenth dynasty. It is generally con- 
ceded that Abraham's journey into Egypt took place 
during the twelfth dynasty. 

3. ABRAHAM'S VICTORY OVER CHODORLAHOMOR. 

Abraham returned to Palestine when Chodorlaho- 
mor, king of Elam, Amraphel, king of Senaar, Arioch, 
king of Ellassar, and Thadal, king of Guti, had con- 
quered five Chanaamen kings, and led away among 
other prisoners, Loth, Abraham's nephew. At this 
news Abraham gathered three hundred and eighteen 
of his servants, pursued the conquerors, and deHvered 
the captives. Such is in substance the account given 
in the fourteenth chapter of Genesis. This narrative 
also comes in for a share of rationalistic criticism by 
declaring it a fable. Knobel, however, in i860, while 
acknowledging a historic tradition, found fault with 
the sacred author. He could not admit that the 
Elamites extended their empire so far in the time of 
Abraham, and must have been deceived by taking 
Assyrians for Elamites. 

After Knobel, they even have denied all historical 
foundation to the Biblical account. Bohlen makes it 
appear that Amraphel is Sardanapel, Arioch, Arbaces and 
Chodorlahomor, Belesys. To believe Hitzig, the account 
of this campaign is taken from that of Sennacherib. 
Grotefend surpasses them all in cool assumption by stat- 
ing that the Elamite invasion is merely an old Babylon- 
ian myth; supporting himself on the fantastic etymology 
which he draws from these names. He sees in Am- 
raphel, the " spring," Arioch, the " summer/' etc., and 
the five Chanaanean kings, only the five complimentary 
days of the Babylonian calendar. These statements, 
largely drawn from the imagination, are completely 



292 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

refuted by modern discoveries relating to the Elamite 
campaign. 

The name Chodorlahomor or Kudur-Lagamar is 
perfectly Elamite. Kudur is met amongst all the 
names of Elam, and Lagamar is a deity, so that Cho- 
dorlahomor means " servant of Lagamar," and not 
" tie of the sheaf," as Grotefend renders it; as the coun- 
try of Elam, subject to this king, its antique power is 
confirmed by discoveries made at Susa, the capital of 
the kino-dom. 

As to Arioch, king of Ellassar, Assyriology has 
furnished a most satisfactory result. We have recov- 
ered his name in that of Eri-Aku, king of Larsa; thus 
the name of the ancient king only found in Genesis, 
and treated as a myth by the critics, reappears to their 
astonished gaze inscribed on the monuments of a very 
high antiquity, in testimony of the historic character 
of the account in question. We add here that Arioch 
signifies " servant of the god moon," and not '' lion," 
as Grotefend renders it, in order to make him a personi- 
fication of the summer. 

When the names of the other confederate kings 
have not yet been recovered, we are at least certain 
about their etymology. Grotefend translates Armaphel 
'' great lamb," whilst this word means '' the son is 
Emir." Thadal or better Thargal, signifies probably 
'' great chief; " but in any case we cannot translate it 
'' experience " or '' setting of the sun," as Grotefend 
distorts it for the purpose of making Thadal the per- 
sonification of winter. This far-fetched straining of 
versions, for the avowed purpose of fitting them to 
represent mythological or allegorical signs, and weaken 
Biblical history, cannot be upheld any longer in the 
face, of facts acquired by science. 



CHAPTER XXVI. 



SODOM; THE ORIGIN OF THE DEAD SEA AND 
LOTHS WIFE. 

IT WAS in the time of Abraham that the catastrophe 
of Sodom took place. During a long time one did 
beheve that this city, and the four other cities of the 
PentapoHs, had been submerged into the Dead Sea, 
and even that this sea dated only since this epoch. This 
is an error which is so much more important to point 
out, because the apologists of the eighteenth century 
have adopted and maintained it against the author of 
the " Questions sur I'Encyclopedie," who was right 
this time. 

That what caused the commentators to believe that 
the Dead Sea deducted its origin from the catastrophe 
of Sodom, is because Moses tells us that Chodorlaho- 
mor defeated the king of Sodom in the valley of Siddim 
" which is the salt sea " or Dead Sea. From this they 
concluded that this sea did not yet exist in the epoch 
of the campaign of the confederate kings, but they in- 
terpreted the text in a wrong manner: they supposed 
that the valley of Siddim formed the whole actual bed 
of the Asphaltic lake. Now, this is not the case. This 
valley forms only a small part of the ground occupied 
to-day by the waters; the lake existed already before, 
and it became enlarged in the time of Abraham in sub- 
merging this valley. 

(293) 



294 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

It is generally admitted to-day, in spite of some con- 
tradictions, that the Jordan never emptied into the Red 
Sea, as it was beUeved in former times. However it 
may be in regard to this point, the Dead Sea existed 
already when Abraham arrived into Palestine. Genesis 
does not tell that the guilty cities were submerged 
into this sea; it assures us, on the contrary, that they 
were consumed by a rain of fire and brimstone, and thus 
destroyed; and the sacred writers teach us that the 
ruins of the cursed cities were visible on the shores of 
the Asphaltic lake. In what place were they situated? 
We do not know, and the opinions in regard to this sub- 
ject are divided. To-day the most place' them in the 
south. Besides, this is of little importance. It 
is sufficient to remark that the southern extremity of 
the Dead Sea is much less deep than the central and 
northern part, and that it is of more recent date. 
Therefore, one can admit that it goes back until to the 
epoch of the catastrophe. This is acknowledged by 
M. Lartch, one of the last savants who have studied the 
question on the site itself. 

loth's WIFE. 

When the day had arrived that fire from heaven 
should destroy Sodom, the angels led away from the 
doomed city Loth and his family, giving them the fol- 
lowing instructions: ''Save thy life, look not back, 
neither stay thou in all the country about." But a rain 
of fire and brimstone having come to fall, the wife of 
Loth looking back was, in punishment for her disobe- 
dience, immediately turned into a pillar of salt 
(Gen. xix). 



SODOM; THE ORIGIN OF THE DEAD SEA. 295 

This history has furnished the pretext for many 
attacks against the Bible. The author of Wisdom 
tells us that in his time the pillar of salt still existed. 
'' A standing pillar of salt is a monument of an incredu- 
lous soul " (x, 7). • How could such an affirmation 
find grace before the RationaHsts, especially Volney! 
The latter writing about the Dead Sea, the author of 
"Ruins" says: "We see there, at intervals, shapeless 
blocks which credulous eyes take for mutilated statues, 
and which the ignorant and superstitious pilgrims re- 
gard as a monument of the adventure of the wife of 
Loth, although it is not said that this woman was 
chano-ed into a stone like Niobe, but into salt, which 
must have melted during the winter following." 

Whatever Volney may say, we can without leaving 
ourselves open to either ignorance or superstition regard 
as authentic the episode related in the Book of Genesis. 
In the first place, we could explain by a miracle either 
the death of the wife of Loth, or the preservation of 
her transformed body until the epoch when the author 
of Wisdom lived. But it is not even necessary 
here to interject the miracle, properly speaking. In 
the neighborhood surrounding the Dead Sea, the at- 
mosphere is as if saturated with salt, and this salt 
impregnates everything into which it can enter. The 
transformation of the wife of Loth into a statue must, 
therefore, be understood probably as a sort of saline 
petrifaction. It is not astonishing that such a statue 
could exist for a long time. "We came across," says 
Vigouroux, " near the Dead Sea, of masses of crystal- 
lized salt, having a height of from 40 to 50 feet, by 
TOO feet width at the base; among these blocks there 
is even one which the local tradition considers as the 



296 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

statue of which Genesis and the Book of Wisdom speak. 
When M. Lynch admits this tradition, without con- 
sidering it as absokitely inadmissible, we can state that 
we are in no need to have recourse to it to justify the 
BibHcal account; because this statue is no longer in ex- 
istence to-day, it does not follow that it had disappeared 
when the author of Wisdom lived. 



CHAPTER XXVIL 



THE PATRIARCH JACOB AND THE MANDRAKES 
OF RUBEN. 

THERE are two qualifications which are equally, 
appreciated by the Orientals: force and cunning. 
He is not the less admired who triumphs over his ene- 
mies by the subtlety of his mind, than he who obtains 
the victory by the strength of his arm; and he who, 
being weak, triumphs through stratagem over the 
stronger, is praised not less than the brave who has 
struck down his antagonist with intrepidity. Among 
the' nomadic people divided into small tribes, and often 
badly governed, where war is perpetual, and where mur- 
der and violence reign supreme, the smaller tribes, who 
are the most numerous, applaud rapturously the fox 
who carries the victory over the lion: it is the revenge 
of the oppressed against the oppressor. We find this 
sentiment among all nations of antiquity. Jacob 
is, as it were, the type of Oriental cunning. Weaker 
than Esau, his brother, or than Laban, his uncle, he 



THE PATRIARCH JACOB. 29/ 

triumphs over both by knowing how to bide his time, 
by watching for the opportunity to come, and when it 
does come, by knowing how to take advantage of it. The 
means which he employed to obtain his end were not 
always irreproachable; but when we judge his conduct, 
we must not lose sight of the fact that he made use of 
the artifices employed by those among whom he lived. 
Moses reports the whole with impartiality, and by mak- 
ing known to us the details of wisdom and virtue, he 
has not concealed the faults. While everything cannot 
be praised in the son of Isaac, the good, however, 
greatly outweighs the evil. Moreover, the critics least 
disposed to indulgence, as Stanley {" Lectures on the 
History of the Jewish Church," 7th ed. London, p. 
45-46)^ after having judged Jacob severely, could not 
refrain from granting him justice in the end. 

I. JACOB BUYS ESAU'S BIRTHRIGHT. 

The first reproach made against Jacob, is for having 
taken advantage of Esau in a manner not at all praise- 
worthy and even unjust, in order to obtain frqm him 
his birthright. Esau, who could not withstand the 
cravings of his gluttonous appetite, when tempted by 
Jacob, who had in his possession a mess of pottage, ex- 
changed his first birthright for this paltry pleasure, thus 
selling his right of inheritance, as related in Genesis 
(xxv). We are under no obligation whatever to up- 
hold Jacob in this circumstance of his life, for he was 
not impeccable, and Holy Scripture, relating the whole 
with impartiahty, does not approve the faults of the 
patriarchs, and of the saints of the Old Testament, 
because it reports them. The sacred historians are 



298 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

narrators, not judges. They do not directly laud the 
praiseworthy acts; neither do they blame the blamable 
acts; they limit themselves to a mere relation of the 
facts as they occurred without commenting good or 
bad. This is something to be borne in mind for a cor- 
rect appreciation of the Sacred Books. " Generally," 
says St. Augustine, " the Scriptures neither approve 
nor disapprove; they leave it to us to criticise and to 
judge, by reconciling the justice and the law of God." 

Besides, in the present case, the conduct of Jacob 
was as worthy of the attention as has been bestowed 
upon it. He had some reason to claim the first birth- 
right, because Esau was his twin brother, and, moreover, 
we must do the justice to remark that he did not de- 
prive his brother of his earthly possessions, deriving 
from the paternal heritage. Esau received from his 
father Isaac an equal share with Jacob, '' the dew of 
heaven and the fat of the earth " (Gen. xxvii, 39), that 
is, the riches of this world; what Jacob particularly 
desired in his barter was only the spiritual blessing. 
Moreover, when Jacob on his return from Mesopotamia, 
desires to make presents to his brother, then Esau 
refuses to accept of his generosity, stating that he was 
quite rich enough himself, and we do not see that there 
had been any dispute between the sons of Isaac on the 
death of their father as to the subject of inheritance 
(Gen. XXXV, 9, 29). 

2. THE BLESSING OF ISAAC. 

What is more blameworthy in the life of Jacob, is 
the means he employed to surreptitiously obtain the 
blessing from Isaac. Listen to what Du Clot has to say 



THE PATRIARCH JACOB. 299 

on this subject: ''Jacob, by the advice of his mother, 
deceives Isaac through a he, in order to obtain the bless- 
ing intended for Esau. This was a fault on the part of 
both. We are not obUged to justify all the actions of the 
patriarchs, because the sacred writers who report them 
do not approve of them. Neither is it necessary to 
assert that these actions were types, figures, mysteries, 
which announced future events; this would not be suffi- 
cient to excuse them; as also, on the other hand, even 
unworthy actions and condemnable in themselves, 
could have, however, after having been committed and 
without having ever been approved, become figures of 
other future events. These unworthy actions of the 
patriarchs, could not have been committed in order to 
figure other events, but, after they had taken place 
against God's wnU who always condemns what is evil, 
they could have been designated to figure and to repre- 
sent posterior events. 

" According to these principles, we can understand 
that God, who had announced His designs regarding 
the two children of Isaac and Rebecca, did not wish 
to derogate from them to punish the two guilty ones. 
Isaac himself, after having learned of the lie of Jacob, 
did not revoke his blessing; he confirmed it, " because 
he remembers " the promise God had made to Rebecca; 
he says to Esau: ''Thy brother has received the bless- 
ing which I had destined for thee; I have blessed him, 
and he shall be blessed, and thou shalt be subject to 
him " (Gen. xxvii, 33, etc.). When Jacob departed for 
Mesopotamia, Isaac renewed to him the blessing and 
the promises made to Abraham (xxxviii, 4). We must 
not conclude from this with the infidels that " God re- 
warded the deceit of Jacob;" there is no question here 



300 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

of a '' reward," but of the execution of a promise which 
God made before Jacob was born. Also, Jacob was 
punished for his lie, through the fear with which, for a 
long time, the threats of Esau inspired him, and 
through the exile which he was obliged to undergo " 
(Du Clot, '' La Sainte Bible vengee," vol. 2, p. 234-236). 

3. CAUSES OF JACOB'S VOYAGE. 

According to the Rationalists we have in the actual 
text of Genesis a flagrant contradiction in regard to 
the motives which determined Jacob to go into Meso- 
potamia: it is said, according to one narrator, in order 
to fly from the wrath of Esau, whom he had sup- 
planted by obtaining the paternal blessing, that Jacob 
makes the journey; according to another, on the con- 
trary, it is to marry a woman of his family, and not a 
Chanaanite (Gen. xxvii, 41-46; xxviii, 1-2). 

The Rationalists have often made analogous objec- 
tions against diverse parts of the Pentateuch and 
against the other Biblical books; but with how little 
foundation, only a little attention is necessary to weigh 
these assertions in their true value. Might not more 
than one motive influence only one action? Victor 
Hugo, in the preface of the " Roi s'Amuse " and in that 
of ^' Lucrece Borgia " gives two dififerent explanations 
of the first of these pieces. Does it follow from this that 
the two explanations are not from the same author, and 
even that both are not true? So also in Genesis, the 
truth is that Jacob goes to Mesopotamia with a double 
motive: the first, to withdraw himself from the wrath of 
his brother Esau; the second, in order to take a wife 
from his family. 



THE PATRIARCH JACOB. 30I 

4. THE SHEEP OF JACOB AND THE MANNER HE 
OBTAINED THEM. 

Genesis (xxx, 25, 43; Cf. xxxi, 7-12, 41) relates that 
Jacob, whilst he watched the flocks of Laban, obtained 
lambs of any color he wished, by throwing green rods 
of poplar, of almond, and of plane trees in the troughs, 
where the water was poured out, and where the sheep 
came to drink at the time when they were about to 
breed. This episode is related in a very obscure manner 
in the Sacred Text; St. Jerome, the translator of our 
Vulgate, has justly remarked this. The commentators 
are not agreed as to the meaning of the divers parts 
of this narrative. The following interpretation appears 
to be the most plausible: 

Jacob, after haying served Laban during fourteen 
years, without receiving any other reward than lia and 
Rachel, after having even been deceived in his first mar- 
riage by his uncle, wishes now to leave him and raise 
flocks on his own account. As God, because of the 
upright character of Jacob, had blessed Laban, this 
greedy and avaricious man tries to retain him. On 
entreaties of his uncle, the son of Isaac consents to 
remain, but under the condition that he will be paid 
for his labors. His demand is too just to allow of its 
rejection; only, if we may employ the familiar and ex- 
pressive figure, both play a fine game, and it is the son- 
in-law who beats the father-in-law. 

In the Orient the most of the sheep are white (Cf. 
Ps. cxlvii, 16; Is. i, 18; Apoc. i, 14); the goats are gener- 
ally black. The white fleece is highly esteemed, because 
it can be used without preparation, and because it can 
be more easily dyed; the skins of the black goats have a 



302 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

higher vakie, because they serve as covers for tents. 
Experience had taught the shepherd that in order to 
obtain white lambs, a process of quite natural selection 
was necessary wherein are joined the rams and the 
white sheep. In the bargain he had made with Laban, 
Jacob asks for his payment the speckled sheep and the 
white goats, namely, a small number which Laban 
already had, and the others which would be the result 
of l)reeding. The proposition is accepted, but as the 
brother of Rebecca is afraid that his nephew, when he 
has in charge the entire flock, might multiply the 
speckled lambs and the white goats, he leaves to him 
only the white sheep and the black goats, and intrusts 
the others to his own children. Thus he believed that 
Jacob would not have any profit, but he was very much 
deceived. 

The spouse of Lia and Rachel obtains spotted lambs, 
thanks to the protection of God (Gen. xxxi, 9) and to 
his own industry (Gen. xxxi, 37-41). We learn by the 
sequel of the narrative of Genesis (xxxi, 7-8) that Laban, 
beholding himself deceived in his hopes, changed ten 
times, i. e., often, the agreements which he had ac- 
cepted, asking for the speckled lambs when they were 
numerous, and the white lambs when they multiplied 
themselves more than the others. 

Such are the main facts of the narrative. In whatever 
manner may be understood the different details, accord- 
ing to the interpretation rendered, the difficulty remains 
always the same. Does Jacob obtain through a mir- 
acle, or in a natural manner, the lambs of one or several 
colors? Voltaire and, following after him, the most of 
the Rationalists desire to behold in the means employed 
by Jacob only a recipe without value, which produces 



THE PATRIARCH JACOB. 30.3 

no result. According to the critics, the proceedings 
of Jacob are ridiculous. '' If it were sufficient," they 
say, '' to place colors before the eyes of the females to 
have young ones of the same color, all the cows would 
produce green calves; and all the lambs, whose mothers 
eat green grass, would be green also. All the women 
who would have seen rose bushes would have offsprings 
of a roseate hue." 

These are pure pleasantries, without any serious 
foundation. When Jacob obtained through a miracle 
the lambs he desired, than all these assertions are false; 
if, on the other hand, the process he employed was 
naturally efficacious, it is not the red or the white color 
of calves that will prove the contrary. In fact, the 
solution of the question is doubtful. Jacob expressly 
attributes to divine protection the success of the means 
he has employed, but the text does not state formally 
that there had been a miracle, and he seems to present 
to us the use of the peeled rods in the watering-places, 
as a natural secret which has operated its effect without 
a special prodigy. Opinions may dififer, therefore, in 
regard to what really occurred. The Greek Fathers 
have generally admitted the miracle. " It was not 
according to the laws of nature," says St. John Chry- 
sostom (Hom. Ivii, 2 in Gen.), " but wonderful and 
supernatural." On the contrary, the most of the Latin 
Fathers support themselves on the testimony of pro- 
fane authors who attribute to the action exercised 
on the imagination of the mothers the color of their 
breed, the phenomenon produced would be conformable 
to the laws of nature. Such is the opinion of St. Jerome 
and of St. Augustine. 



304 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

5. THE MANDRAKES OF RUBEN. 

Genesis relates that one day the eldest son of Jacob, 
being yet a child, found in the field of Mesopotamia 
duada'im and brought them to his mother Lia. Rachel 
having seen these dudaim, wished for some and obtained 
them through her sister (xxx, 14-15). These dudaim 
it is claimed, are the fruits of the vernal mandrake, to 
which antiquity attributed a prolific virtue: Rachel 
desired to eat them in order to have children. ''It is 
thus," state the infidels, '' that we find already in the 
hrst Book of Moses, a belief in superstition as evidenced 
in the powers attributed to this plant." 

Indeed, it is generally believed that the dudaim is 
the mandrake, the Hebrew word signifying " love- 
plant." The Arabs call it toffa el djin, or /'apples of 
the devil," yabrouh, etc. There exists in no Semitic 
language, except in the Hebrew, a plant called dudaim. 
The Arabs believe that the mandrake excites the senses 
even to madness, hence the name " apples of the devil," 
which they have given to it. According to Hesychius, 
the surname of Venus was Mandragoritis, and the fruit 
of the mandrake was called " love apples." Plato in his 
Republic speaks of the liquor drawn from the mandrake 
as intoxicating. Dioscorides identified the mandrake 
with the kirkaiuy or plant of Circe, because it was 
believed that this famous enchantress effected her en- 
chantments with the aid of this wonderful plant. It was 
made use of to compound philters. Josephus speaks 
it under the name of baaras as of a magical herb, en- 
dowed with power to expel the demon. This plant 
enjoyed great celebrity among the sorcerers of the 
Middle Ages, who attributed to it all manner of magical 



THE PATRIARCH JACOB. 305 

powers. Shakspeare has made allusion several times 
in his dramas to the properties they attributed to it. 
In the last century, the quack doctors and venders of 
extraordinary remedies sold on the markets, images of 
the mandrake which the credulous country folk con- 
sidered possessed of magic properties. 

The duda'im are named only twice in the Bible, that 
is, in the episode of Genesis and in the Canticle of Canti- 
cles. The ancient translators have rendered this word 
into mandrake, but the modern commentators are far 
from agreeing that this interpretation is correct. Some 
believe that the dudaim are a kind of small melon, called 
among the Persians distembujeh. It is by this word that 
the Persian version of the Bible has rendered the duda'im 
of Genesis. It grows in Syria and in Egypt, as well as 
in Persia. It is very odoriferous and juicy, and the 
women of the harem delight to hold it in their hands, 
like the lemon, on account of its agreeable odor. 

We admit, nevertheless, because this opinion ap- 
pears the most probable, that the dudaim are man- 
drakes. But in accepting this interpretation, we except 
the marvelous properties attributed to these plants. 
These magical efifects are purely imaginary; the man- 
drake is a narcotic, and travelers and naturalists are 
not in agreement as to the character of the peculiar 
odor the plant emits; it appears to be agreeable to 
some, and obnoxious to others. But, at least all serious 
observers acknowledge that it has not at all the power 
which popular credulity attributes to it. 

Whatever the properties of the mandrake may be, 
one fact is certain, namely, that the Scripture does not 
attribute to it any property. The Scripture is not 
responsible for the controversy which has raged round 

D. B.— 20 



3o6 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

this episode of Rachel. It is only necessary to read 
the sacred account, to become convinced that it is only 
through the most arbitrary and the most false interpre- 
tation that the writer can be accused of giving to the 
dudaim any magical properties. St. Augustine, who 
had studied the plant out of curiosity on account of 
the mention made of it by Genesis, has correctly stated 
that the text does not attribute any particular property 
to the dudaim, but merely states that Rachel had 
desired them. Why did she desire them? We do not 
know, Moses does not even state that Rachel ate of its 
fruit. The dudaim might have been only a simple 
bouquet of mandrake flowers, the beauty of which 
charmed the sister of Lia. Omnes flores amabiles says 
a commentator as to this subject. It is believed that 
the Hebrew word signifies " love," and, perhaps, to this 
etymology has been attributed peculiar ideas which 
had been in vogue regarding the virtue of this plant. 



CHAPTER XXVIII. 



THE PATRIARCH JOSEPH. 
I. The History of Joseph Confirmed by Scientific Discoveries. 

THE history of Joseph is related in detail in the Book 
of Genesis. The subject which Moses treats 
therein gave occasion to him to relate the Egyptian 
customs with quite minute details. Now, as these cus- 
toms are known to us to-day through the monuments 
recovered, and through the deciphering of the hiero- 
glyphics, we can verify with perfect ease, all the asser- 



THE PATRIARCH JOSEPH. 307 

tions of the sacred author, and note whether they are 
conformable to science and history. This labor has 
been done mostly, not by friends of the Bible, but, on 
the contrary, by persons who had in view to discover 
what would prove inexactitudes of the Bible, and show, 
if at all possible, that Moses is not the author of the 
narrative. The result of these inquiries has been the 
most absolute confirmation of the Biblical narrative 
even in the smallest details. In order to be able to state 
what he did, it was not sufficient that the sacred author 
should merely have passed through Egypt, but he must 
have lived there for a long time, and even at the court, 
and he must have witnessed the operating of the 
mechanism of administration. Now, such precisely are 
the conditions which we see fulfilled by Aloses, to whom 
we attribute this account. We do not need to prove 
in detail the exactitude of the Biblical text which to-day 
is admitted by all, but we content ourselves with au- 
thenticating certain particulars which have been the 
most often subject to disputation. 

2. ANSWER TO OBJECTIONS. 

Putiphar, the master of Joseph, is termed Eunuch 
of the Pharaoh.^ Now, the Rationalists deny the ex- 
istence of eunuchs in Egypt. The Bible, however, is 
correct. Since we meet with eunuchs everywhere in 
the Orient, from the most remote antiquity, why should 
there not have been any in Egypt? It is true that 
monogam}^ was the general rule there, but the Pharaohs 
had often several wives, the one a queen, the others 
simply favorites, and, consequently, the presence of 
eunuchs as keepers of the royal harem is not improba- 



Gen. xxxix. 



308 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

ble. But there is more evidence on this point: the 
Egyptian monuments depict eunuchs, recognizable by 
the absence of the beard, the development of the chest, 
the obesity, and peculiar color of the skin.; They accom- 
pany the women, play on musical instruments and 
occupy themselves with domestic labors. 

But, it is said in answer, Putiphar to whom is given 
this title, was a married man. To this we reply: i. The 
ancient writings, for example, the " Romance of the 
Two Brothers," make mention of married eunuchs, and 
we still meet to-day with such who possess harems. 2. 
The titles of dignity must not always be taken in their 
etymological sense; let us cite, for instance, the French 
'' Chevaliers," which literally means horsemen, but 
in fact are knights and, as a rule, hold high positions 
at the royal court. In Chaldea all the court officers 
were called '' eunuchs," and it may be that the Hebrews, 
originally of this country, had given this name to the 
dignitaries of the Egyptian court. 

3. THE COLLAR GIVEN TO JOSEPH BY THE PHARAOH. 

When Joseph became minister of the Pharaoh, the 
latter, among other insignia of power, gave him a 
golden collar.^ '' It is scarcely necessary," says Bohlen, 
*' that the precious stones belong to a posterior epoch." 
Hence, he concludes that this history is not authentic. 
Now, the monuments give testimony absolutely con- 
trary to his assertion; not only do they present the 
gods and the kings adorned with collars, not only does 
the stela in the Louvre of Paris show a Pharaoh invest- 
ing his favorite with a collar, but we are in possession of 
collars and other Egyptian jewelry of a very remote 



1 Gen. xli, 42. 



- THE PATRIARCH JOSEPH. 309 

antiquity, and the workmanship of which is not inferior 
in any respect to the ornamented jeweh-y of our time, 
and yet behold the mention of these things in the story 
of Joseph, the Rationalists assert, is a proof that it is 
not veracious. 

4. DIVINATION BY THE CUP. 

Hated by his brethren and sold into slavery by them, 
Joseph wishes to know their sentiments in regard to 
Benjaniin, and hardly had his brethren departed he 
pursues them as thieves, having first caused a valuable 
cup to be secreted in their possessions. The cup is 
recovered where the steward had placed it and he cries 
out: '' The cup which you have stolen is that in which 
my Lord drinketh, and in which He is wont to divine."^ 
As they did not discover until lately anywhere else this 
divination by means of a cup, the Rationalists profited 
by this to accuse Genesis of errors and superstition, 
and certain Catholic writers believed it best to suppose, 
in this passage, an alteration of the text. According to 
Aurivillius it would be necessary in order to admit that 
Genesis had made such a statement, to prove that the 
Egyptians employed, at the time of Joseph or later on, 
the mode of divination. The proof desired by Aurivil- 
lius has been obtained. The custom of divination by 
the cup has existed in Egypt even to the present day. 
Mr. Norden relates that, in his voyage to Egypt, a 
certain Baram received him very courteously and said 
to him: " I have consulted my cup and found therein 
that you are of those whom our prophet has said 
would come from the disguised Franks, etc." Another 
striking example w^as reported in the '' Revue des deux 



I Gen. xliv, q. 



310 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Mondes " (August, 1833). It is, therefore, very proba- 
ble that the use of the divination cup was not entirely 
unknown in ancient Egypt, and besides we find the use 
thereof in other countries, as, for instance, in Persia and 
Thibet. 

But the words of the steward of Joseph give rise 
to another difficulty: can we not conclude from them 
that Joseph was addicted to magic? Certainly not. 
The overseer may have mentioned this particular on his 
own authority, being of the opinion, as were other 
Egyptians, that Joseph owed his great knowledge to 
magic. But even supposing the steward spoke thus 
in the name of Joseph, we could say, with St. Thomas, 
that Joseph could speak on this occasion, according to 
the common superstition which prevailed in Egypt, 
without affirming his own belief in it. 

5. THE POSSESSION OF ALL THE EGYPTIAN SOIL, BY 
THE PHARAOH. 

In exchange for the grain which he distributed 
among the Egyptians, Joseph made the people give to 
him their silver; then their cattle, and finally their lands. 
Thus, the Pharaoh became proprietor of the whole soil 
of Egypt, except the domains of the priests, who, sup- 
ported at the expense of the king, did not need to buy 
grain. This important act of the administration of 
Joseph has been attacked by the Rationalists who have 
contested both its reality and morality. 

In contesting the reality of the fact one of them 
says: " It is a wonderful story which could be hatched 
out only in the imagination of an Ephramite. 
The Egyptians since all the epochs known were proprie- 



XHE PATRIARCH JOSEPH. 31 I 

tors of their goods." The assertion of Genesis is, never- 
theless, correct; everything goes to prove this: (a) The 
importance of the fact is such that a writer would not 
have dared to invent it for fear of being contradicted 
by all the evidence which existed on the subject. '' One 
does not trifle thus," says Eichthal, '' with the history 
of a great people, who live alongside of him, and under 
his very eyes, so to say." (b) According to Diodor of 
Sicily, the Egyptian soil was divided into three parts, 
belonging to the king, to the priests and to the soldiers 
(the privilege of the latter may have been introduced 
posterior to Joseph); hence, the mass of the people 
could not possess the soil, and in fact the monuments 
never designate single individuals as land proprietors, 
(c) Egyptology estabhshes the existence, under the 
Ancient and Middle Empire, of quite a turbulent feud- 
ality, proprietors of nomes or hereditary principalities; 
imder the new empire, after the Hyksos, contem- 
poraries of Joseph, we find no longer any trace of this 
organization. May we not suppose that the legislation 
of Joseph had given the death blow to this landed feud- 
ality? Thus we see Ramses III. speaking as the pro- 
prietor of Egypt : '' I planted trees and shrubs all over 
the country, and I permitted the people to sit in their 
shadow." (d) Herodotus relates that Seostris (con- 
temporary of Moses) divided the soil of Egypt into 
equal portions among all the inhabitants: now, this 
division presupposes an anterior condition of proprie- 
torship, such as that which resulted from the measure 
taken by Joseph. 

Joseph's action from a moral standpoint has been 
severely condemned. He is charged with tyranny. 
But : (a) The proprietary right of the Pharaoh remained 



312 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BI^LE. 

a purely nominal one; the Egyptians continued to cul- 
tivate their lands, paying a tax of the fifth part of the 
revenue; in fact, the measure taken by Joseph was 
equivalent to an increase in the tax rates, (b) The 
Hyksos or shepherd kings, who reigned at that time, 
were foreigners and conquerors; and there is nothing 
astonishing in the fact that they displayed less consider- 
ation for the people than did the native kings, or that 
they profited by the circumstances to more firmly 
establish their dominion. To-day every citizen of an 
annexed province remains the master of his land; 
formerly only a few were usually allowed this privilege, 
(c) The proprietorship could never be established in 
Egypt as elsewhere; the fertility of the land depends 
there upon the measures taken to regulate the inunda- 
tion of the Nile, and these measures could not be taken 
except by permission of the highest ruling power; hence 
for the public usefulness the lands were held in trust, as 
it were, by the state, (d) In the Orient the territorial 
proprietorship has never been considered and respected 
in the same manner as common with us; nowhere do 
they look upon the products of the soil as belonging 
exclusively to the owner of the lands on which they 
grew; neither is the land so carefully cultivated, and 
consequently the soil is an object much less valued than 
it is in our countries. Thus, we see to-day the viceroy 
of Egypt buying from his subjects their lands, in order 
to obtain revenues; Mehemet-Ali did not take this 
trouble, he simply confiscated the land. Hence, when 
we consider the Oriental customs and the peculiar 
proprietary conditions of Egypt, it will be seen that 
Joseph, in the whole, acted as a wise administrator, and 
one will conclude with the Rationalist Ewald: " That it 



THE PATRIARCH JOSEPH. 313 

is nonsensical to reproach Joseph, for his conduct does 
not need any further proofs." 

6. ANSWER TO OBJECTIONS MADE BY THE RATIONAL- 
ISTS AGAINST THE AUTHENTICITY AND VERACITY 
OF THE HISTORY OF JOSEPH. 

From all these difficulties the conclusion can be 
easily drawn. When the most skillful savants, in the 
enlightened nineteenth century, have deceived them- 
selves so greatly on the conditions, customs and rule 
of ancient Egypt, it would have been impossible for 
any one one except Moses to give faithfully, several 
centuries after the facts, and in Palestine, an account 
so replete with minute details. This, however, is not 
the conclusion which some Rationalists draw. They 
acknowledge in general the perfect probability of the 
account, but they nevertheless endeavor to deny the 
existence of Joseph; for them this history is only a 
romance, invented after the separation of the tribes, 
by some Ephraemite, to praise the kingdom of Israel 
at the expense of Juda. 

If the author had been an Ephraemite nothing 
would prove that he did not write his account from 
more ancient documents, and the exactitude of the 
details regarding the Egyptian customs should make 
the infidel suppose this. However, the system of our 
adversaries will not stand investigation at all; the 
author of the story of Joseph, instead of glorifying the 
fathers of the tribes of Israel, attributes to them great 
crimes, and it is particularly to Juda that he assigns an 
upright character when the writer relates how the son 
of Jacob saved the life of Joseph, and how he made the 
most devoted efforts to deliver Benjamin. 



314 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

But, finally, what evidence do the Rationalists pre- 
sent in their system? They refer: i. To the difficulties 
in regard to the eunuchs and the landed proprietors, 
difficulties we have refuted, i. They behold in chapter 
xxxvii of Genesis two different accounts of the sale 
of Joseph: in the one it is Ruben who causes Joseph 
to be thrown into a cistern; in the other it is Juda who 
instigates the sale; in the one he is sold to Madianites 
(Gen. xxxvi, 37), in the other to Ismaelites (xxxvii, 20). 
It is sufficient to read this chapter to perceive that 
Ruben and Juda interfered successively, and the 28th 
verse gives to the purchasing merchants the two names 
of Madianites and Ismaelites. 3. Again, according 
to the infidel criticism, the evidence which establishes 
that the history of Joseph is a pure legend is found in 
the fact that the prophets do not speak of him. It is 
not expected that they should speak of him unless 
their subjects so demanded, as if, for instance, they 
had summarized the history of their people. Besides, 
it is false to say that they made no reference to him 
whatever. Isaias recalls the establishment of Israel 
in Egypt (Is. liii, 4) ; Ezechiel mentions a feature of the 
history of Joseph (Ezechiel xlvii, 13); so also Exodus 
(xiii, 19), Josue (xxiv, 32), and especially the Psalm 
civ, 16-23. 

We see, therefore, that this system of the infidels 
cannot be maintained; besides, if the history of Joseph 
is eliminated from Genesis, how will the sojourn of the 
Hebrews in Egypt be explained, where we find their 
traces imtil the present time? How can we explain 
the singular privilege of the two sons of Joseph, who 
also received a share in the Promised Land, and became 
the fathers of two tribes? Indeed, to relate the history 



THE BOOK OF JOSUE AND GALILEO. 315 

of Israel with Joseph left out would be as difficult and 
nonsensical as to write a histor}^ of America in which 
Washington played no part. We must conclude, there- 
fore, that all the attacks of the Rationahsts do not pre- 
vail against the authenticity and veracity of the history 
of Joseph: tradition, reason and the testimony of scien- 
tific research all unanimously point to Moses as the 
author of this history, and also evidence that no one 
else except him could have written it. 



CHAPTER XXIX. 



THE BOOK OF JOSUE AND GALILEO. 
I . Antiquity of the Book of Josue. 

THE Book of Josue shares the lor of the Pentateuch 
before the infidel criticism. It condemns both as 
being unw^orthy of belief. The first writing does not 
merit any more confidence than the second, we are told, 
because the latter is only a part of the whole, a member 
of the same body. The denomination Pentateuch is 
incorrect : Hexateuch, we must say, for the work placed 
at the head of our Bible is not composed of five books, 
but of six, and the Book of Josue forms the sixth: it is 
of the same age as the Pentateuch, compiled in the same 
manner, and its informations are derived from the same 
source. 



3l6 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

At first the Rationalists pretended that the Book of 
Josue consisted of at least twelve different fragments. 
But the fragmentary hypothesis, having been weighed 
and found wanting, was abandoned for a new system, 
that of the complimentary hypothesis. They pretended 
that the pieces designed under the name of Elohists, in 
the Pentateuch and in Josue, had belonged primitively 
to one sole writing which embraced the whole time 
elapsed since the beginning of the world, not only until 
the death of Moses, but until that of Josue. A few 
critics adopted the foundation of this opinion. Thus 
arose the idea of the Hexateuch. The other Rational- 
ists agreed neither with these few, nor among them- 
selves, in regard to the numerous points of detail. They 
maintain, however, to-day, the existence of the Hexa- 
teuch. The Book of Josue presupposes that the Pen- 
tateuch is the work of Moses; now it is this that the 
infidels do not wish to admit at any consideration. 
Hence, it is especially the desire to negative the super- 
natural which makes them reject the antiquity and the 
authenticity of the Book of Josue. We have not to 
defend here the supernatural, but w^e will answer the 
special objections in a manner as follows: 

Although the Greeks " invented the title of Penta- 
teuch," as Reuss says, it is probable that they did not 
invent the distinction of the work into five books, and 
that this arrangement is more ancient than the trans- 
lation of the Septuagint. It is certain, at any rate, that 
the distinction of the Books of Moses and of the Book of 
Josue did not originate with the Greeks, and this is the 
only point which is important to establish here. The 
most ancient tradition has always considered the two 
works completely distinct. As far back as we can go 



THE BOOK OF JOSUE AND GALILEO. 317 

we see the Jews class the Pentateuch in an apart cate- 
gory; the Book of Josue is ranked in a different series, 
that of the first prophets, where it occupies the first 
place. It is, therefore, established that a tradition 
which had its birth in a very ancient epoch, and which 
has never been contradicted until at the close of the last 
century, certifies us the antiquity of the history which 
relates the conquest and the occupation of the Promised 
Land. The reasons brought forward by criticism 
against the traditional belief, do they shake its solidity? 
Not at all. 

It is true the Book of Josue is intrinsically connected 
with the Pentateuch, inasmuch as it takes up the history 
of the Hebrew people at the conclusion of Deuteronomy. 
The tribes which Moses had led out of Egypt did not 
die with him; their history does not end with that of 
their liberator; they continued without him the work 
which they began with him; they were already on the 
shores of the Jordan; they but needed to cross it to 
undertake the conquest of the Promised Land, for so 
long a time the object of their vows and of their desires. 
The writing which bears the name of Josue relates to 
us the history of this conquest; it has, in consequence, 
a necessary relation to the books which precede it. But 
while relative to the writings of Moses, and a continua- 
tion of them, it is not identical with them. 

'' It is true," says Reuss, '' that a writer who has 
commenced his writing with glowing promises made 
to the patriarchs has to conclude by showing us their 
fulfillment; at least he could not pass in silence the 
consummation thereof." What a singular deduction, 
and how very clearly it shows that rationalism is always 
blind with partisan spirit! Certainly Moses could not 



3l8 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

pass in silence the conquest of the Promised Land, 
provided he had not died before the end of his task. In 
order that the author of the Pentateuch could relate 
the fulfillment of the promises, they had first to be 
fulfilled; now, such had not happened when Moses, the 
author of these promises, died. They were fulfilled 
under Josue, and by Josue and a writer posterior to 
Moses has completed the account. 

Besides, we must remark that the existence of Deut- 
eronomy, placed between the Numbers and the Book of 
Josue, renders quite inadmissible the hypothesis that the 
six first writings of the Old Testament form only one 
whole or, as claimed, a Hexateuch. Deuteronomy 
is an abridgment and a summary of the Mosaic Law, it 
forms its conclusion; consequently, it ends and finishes 
it; what comes afterwards can be only a new work which 
resumes the thread of the history there where the pre- 
ceding author had left it. If the Plexateuch had ever 
existed in the sense as the Rationalists understand it, 
Deuteronomy should form, not the fifth, but the sixth 
part of the Pentateuch or Hexateuch. 

In its composition the Book of Josue has nothing 
in common with the Pentateuch; it forms a complete 
whole, and it has a plan which is peculiar to it. Its 
subject is the conquest and the division of the southern 
and northern Palestine; the second subdivision enumer- 
ates the possessions attributed to the tribes of Israel 
in the conquered country. Thus, we have not a kind 
of journal written day by day as is Exodus, Leviticus 
and Numbers, nor a series of discourses like in Deuter- 
onomy; it is quite a new and different plan. The author 
makes known to us the history of Josue and the people 
which the successor of Moses led to victory, from the 



THE BOOK OF JOSUE AND GALILEO. 319 

moment when he became its chief until his death. 
Never had a writing a more remarkable individuality. 
The adversaries of the Bible are themselves forced to 
acknowledge that the Book of Josue has a different 
character from that of the Pentateuch. 

The Book of Josue is, therefore, a separate work, an 
independent work. It is connected with the Penta- 
teuch Uke the Acts of the Apostles are connected with 
the Gospels, because it is the sequel of the same history; 
but it is, nevertheless, a complete, distinct writing. Un- 
doubtedly the language is alike in many respects to that 
of the Books of Moses, but what is there astonishing 
in this, and how could it be otherwise? Its author is 
very probably Josue himself, because he speaks as an 
eye-witness of the events he relates; hence, he had lived 
with Moses, he served him more than once, as we may 
suppose, at least as secretary, therefore he should speak 
and write in a manner very much resembling that of 
Moses. The book which carries his name, did it eman- 
ate from another, as some maintain, certainly could not 
have been composed in an epoch posterior to David, 
because, as an examination of its contents show, when it 
was written Jerusalem was not yet the capital of Israel, 
but belonged still to the Jebusites (Jos. xv, 63). 
Hence, when this book was written it could not have 
been but a short time after the epoch of the exodus, 
and the Hebrew language could not have undergone a 
great change. 

2. HISTORIC AND SCIENTIFIC DIFFICULTIES. 

Besides the general accusation against the antiquity 
of the Book of Josue, the negative criticism attacks as 
contradictory and as inadmissible certain details con- 



320 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

tained in this book. It is hardly necessary to state that 
they reject as impossible the miraculous passage of the 
Jordan, and the not less miraculous taking of the city 
of Jericho (Jos. iii, vi). But we have not to discuss 
here the impossibility or improbability of miracles, we 
will give attention only to facts which, irrespective of 
their supernatural character, present some particular 
difficulty. 

3. THE CIRCUMCISION AT GALGALA. 

After having crossed the Jordan, Josue, by the 
order of God, caused the circumcision of all the children 
of Israel who had not yet received this sign of the 
Covenant between Jehovah and His people. Taking 
this incident as a basis, numerous objections have been 
raised against the historical character of the " Hexa- 
teuch " in general, and against the Book of Josue in 
particular. The critics have endeavored to discover 
contradictions in the different accounts concerning this 
practice of the Jews. 

Nothing is more simple than the reconciliation of 
these '' different facts." Far from contradicting them- 
selves, on the contrary, they explain themselves, one 
perfectly substantiating the other. All that is related 
about the circumcision is founded upon the precept 
given to Abraham in Genesis. Josue formally identifies 
the ancient practice when we read in his account that 
those of the Israelites who had gone forth from Egypt 
without being circumcised " had disobeyed the order 
of God " (Jos. V, 6). An angel threatens to kill the son 
of Moses or Moses himself, when he returned into 
Egypt with his family, because the child was not cir- 
cumcised. The menacing attitude of the angel can be 



THE BOOK OF JOSUE AND GALILEO. 32 1 

explained only in the existence of the law of circum- 
cision. Punishment can be justly inflicted only for 
the violation of a law. The account of Exodus is very 
laconic, and does not enter into any details, but sufh- 
cient is said to render it comprehensible as a whole. It 
is Sephora, the wife of Moses, who circumcises the 
child. The law did not exclude women from officiating 
in this rite. But it is evident that Sephora performs it 
with reluctance, and only because she has no other 
alternative. When, afterwards, she exclaims to Moses: 
" O bloody spouse art thou to me," her remark is 
equivalent to an admission that it was she that had 
delayed the circumcision of her son. Moses would have 
wished to observe on this point the customs of his race, 
but his wife had prevented the fulfillment of a ceremony 
which was repugnant to her because it was bloody. It was 
not expedient, however, that at the moment when Moses 
presented himself before the people to transmit to them 
the divine orders, that he should present in his own 
family an example of the violation of the bond con- 
cluded between God and his fathers; the Almighty com- 
mand, therefore, compels Sephora , who had not 
complied with the vows of her husband, to consent 
finally to the fulfillment of the law, and, in spite of her 
dismcUnation, she resigns herself to the task, not, how- 
ever, without complaining over its performance in the 
midst of a desert. The fact is nowhere '' mentioned as 
something new anci extraordinary," not one word insin- 
uates this- in the account which, on the contrary, we 
repeat, presupposes the existence of the rite of circum- 
cision. 

But, adds Reuss, the Israelites were not circumcised 
during the sojourn in the desert. Now, " a disobe- 
D. B.— 21 



322 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

dience of this kind to a fundamental article of the 
theocratic covenant, under the very eyes, and with the 
toleration of the legislator is inexpUcable." Nothing 
is nevertheless more easy to explain, and it is only 
necessary to read the account itself of Josue with un- 
prejudiced eyes, without endeavoring to contort every 
statement into a contradiction, in order to see therein 
clearly the reason why this rite was not practiced in the 
desert. The Israelites in the solitudes of Sinai lived as 
nomads; hence, they often changed their encampments, 
and as they were surrounded by hostile tribes they had 
to be ready to depart at a moment's warning. Under 
such conditions circumcision was impracticable, be- 
cause several days are required after the operation to 
allow the wounds to heal. Moses had, therefore 
decided that the circumstances dispensed the people 
from the law until the time when they would enjoy rest 
and security, which would enable them to resume the 
practice. Josue himself demanded an observance of 
the rite when the tribes of Israel had crossed the Jordan 
and only, after receiving the report which the spies sent 
to Jericho had made to him, he had the assurance that 
the people could rest in peace at Galgala without fear 
of disturbance. All this clearly corroborates the exact 
words of the sacred texts: " After they were all circum- 
cised in the same place of the camp until they were 
healed" (Jos. v, 8). 

Finally, what Mr. Reuss adds is also founded on an 
equally fallacious interpretation. '' The circumcision," 
he says, '' being practiced by the Egyptians and other 
nations, we cannot see how it could be a distinctive 
sign of the Israelites." Certainly one does not see it, 
but what should oblige us to see it? The professor of 



THE BOOK OF JOSUE AND GALILEO. 323 

Strasburg here makes the Bible teh something that it 
does not tell at all. He has such an ardent desire to fault- 
find, that he, himself, falls into the errors with which 
he wishes to charge the Sacred Scriptures. It is not 
the Bible that tells us that circumcision is " a distinct- 
ive sign of the Israelites; " it is Mr. Reuss who kindly 
makes this loan and gathers in the interest. God, in 
Genesis, says to Abraham that circumcision will be 
"a sign of the covenant" (Gen. xvii, 11), which they 
conclude together, but the word '' distinctive," nor 
anything approaching to it is found in these words. 
Now, the error which the rationalistic commentator 
pretends to discover consists solely in the word, " dis- 
tinctive," which he adds himself to the sacred text. 
Far, therefore, from being contradictory, the Biblical 
account is perfectly in harmony in all its parts, and the 
Book of Josue only conhrms what the Pentateuch 
relates. 

4. THE CONQUEST OF PALESTINE. 

Many objections have been made against the con- 
quest of Palestine by Josue. One has pretended that 
what we read in regard to this subject in the book 
which bears his name is full of contradictions and given 
the lie by the Book of Judges and the Books of Kings. 
When statements of this character are made, it com.es 
from a false interpretation of the diverse passages of 
the text, which have been made with the purpose in 
view of so arranging the text that various passages are 
placed in opposition. One supposes that the sacred 
author afBrms that the conqueror of the Promised 
Land took hold of " all " the cities, of '' all " the strong 
places, in '' all " the parts of Palestine. Now, Scripture 



324 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

does not affirm anything of the kind. Thus it is pre- 
tended that the Books of Kings contradict Josue because 
they say it was the Pharaoh of Egypt, who, under Solo- 
mon took Gazer, a city which should have been taken 
already by Josue. There is no contradiction here. The 
Book of Josue mentions the death of the king of Gazer, 
but says nothing about the capture of his capital. Be- 
sides, we must not be surprised that several cities, taken 
and burnt by the invaders, nevertheless remained or fell 
again into the possession of their first inhabitants. The 
latter could retake them or need never have abandoned 
them completely; for one would have a wrong notion 
of the wars of this epoch were he to suppose that the 
conqueror left a garrison in the conquered places to 
keep them under his obedience. The general custom, 
even of the most powerful monarchs, as the kings of 
Ninive, for a long time, was to devastate a city by 
pillage and the torch, in order to destroy its usefulness 
to the enemy; but generally the destruction was not 
complete, and when the conqueror had withdrawn with 
his troops, nobody prevented the inhabitants from re- 
pairing the disasters of war, a proceeding they hastened 
almost always to effect. This explains how cities 
besieged, taken and burnt by the Hebrews could be 
erected anew and flourishing some years afterwards, and 
in the possession of its ancient possessors. Such was 
the case v/ith Hebron, Dabir (Jos. x, 36-37; xi, 21; 
xiv, 12-13; XV, 13-14; Judges i, 10). 

The Rationalists arise also, in the name of morality, 
to denounce the war of extermination which the Israel- 
ities raged against the Chanaanites. What right, cried 
out already the Manicheans in the early ages; what 
right, repeat the enemies of the Bible in our days, had 



THE BOOK OF JOSUE AND GALILEO. 325 

the descendants of Jacob to destroy this people and take 
their country ? How could God, the Father and Creator 
of all men, ordain the massacre of these, His children? 

Holy Scripture answers us that God chastised the 
Canaanites for their crimes (Gen. xv, 16; Lev. xviii, 20; 
Wisdom xii). Certainly He has the right to punish 
and cause to be punished at His pleasure the sins of 
His creatures; He can strike them with death if He so 
desires, either through a sickness or through accident, 
through plague, famine, pest or war; whatever the form 
of death may be, it is within the divine prerogative, 
and it is only through want of reflection that one who 
believes in the existence of God can contest His right, 
His power, or question His justice. 

As to the part played by the Israelites in the exter- 
mination, without speaking here of the donation of the 
land of Canaan, which the Lord had made to their 
fathers, it is sufficient to remember that the oppression 
of Egypt had forced them to leave this inhospitable 
country, and that the conquest of Palestine was for 
them only a struggle for existence, an act which has been 
proclaimed in our days as one of the greatest laws which 
rule the world. They were in need of a place to lay 
their heads, of lands to give them food, of homes for the 
people; force alone was their recourse. Besides, their 
manner of warfare was not more bloody, nor more cruel 
than was usual to their day; they even treated the 
Canaanites more humanely than the latter treated their 
enemies. 

5. THE MIRACLE OF JOSUE COMMANDING THE SUN TO 
STAND STILL AND THE CONDEMNATION OF GALILEO. 

There is, perhaps, not a single passage of the 



326 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Scriptures which caused more controversy than that 
in which the Book of Josue relates how the battle of 
Bethoron ended. In this battle the Chanaanites of 
southern Palestine were completely routed with great 
slaughter. Here the objections multiply and accumu- 
late. And it is not only the sacred text that is attacked, 
but also the commentators and the Church itself. By 
a strange phenomenon, wherein during long centuries 
was seen only a miracle which everyone accepted in 
making simply an act of faith, without question, to-day 
everything appears suspicious, obscure, doubtful and 
inacceptable, not only to the infidels, but also to ortho- 
dox Protestants, and even to some Catholics. The 
famous passage is found in Josue x, 12-14. 

The first difficulty which the reading of this passage 
presents is to know in what sense we have to interpret 
it. All the ancient interpreters have taken it in the 
literal sense; they saw therein that the sun really re- 
volved around the earth, that the earth was im-movable, 
that the sun and the moon had really stopped in their 
course by order of Josue, and that the day of the 
battle of Bethoron had been thus the longest day that 
ever took place upon the earth. To-day multitudinous 
objections are raised against every particular of this 
exposition. 

As to the first point, that is, the stopping of the sun, 
the ancient interpretation is universally abandoned, 
since astronomy has established that the sun is the 
center of our solar system, and that it is the earth which 
revolves around this planet. When the conqueror of 
the Canaanites commanded the sun to stand still, this 
does not imply that he admitted the system one has 
called since the system of Ptolemy, teaching the diurnal 



THE BOOK OF JOSUE AND GALILEO. 327 

movement of the sun around the earth; he has enunci- 
ated the general beUef, in judgmg the facts after the 
sensible appearances. There is no more question in 
the Book of Josue of the system of Ptolemy than of that 
of Copernicus. The Hebrew general beseeching a mira- 
cle employs the language used in his time and in his 
country, and God, granting his request, employs the 
means which he judges proper. Throughout the Scrip- 
ture the sacred authors express themselves in an anal- 
ogous manner, that is, conformably to the popular 
belief in regard to scientific questions, and the interpre- 
ters are unanimous in admitting this fact. Hence, one 
must not seek in their words scientific apophthegms 
which they never had the intention of formulating. 

But in what sense have we to understand the account 
in the Book of Josue? The liberal Rationalists, and a 
certain number of Protestants, to whom we have to add 
a few Catholics, who are frightened at the mention of a 
miracle, maintain that neither the Hebrew poet 
nor the historian beheld any prodigy, strictly speak- 
ing, in that what we call improperly the standing 
still of the sun, and consequently, that the readers of 
to-day must not discover therein anything wonderful. 
But this interpretation appears to be quite forced, and it 
seems difiicult to make it agree with the letter of the 
text of Josue. It is, moreover, in contradiction to what 
we read in Ecclesiasticus: ''Was not the sun stopped in 
his anger? and one day made as two?" (Eccli. xlvi, 5). 

It is true that several savants and critics maintain 
that the miracle of the stopping of the earth, in her 
diurnal rotation, would have brought on such a revolu- 
tion in our planetary system, and would have been the 
cause of a catastrophe so immense that it is impossible 



328 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

to believe in so abnormal a disturbance, of which, 
besides, no trace remains. To this objection we can 
answer that the suspension of the movement of our 
globe would have changed nothing in the universe, 
outside of the prolongation of an earthly day, only in 
so far as the Master of the universe would have willed, 
for it depended upon His will to prevent all the catas- 
trophes which would have naturally resulted from the 
miracle of Josue. Those who admit that our earth really 
stopped, and among these we must place Galileo himself 
(Cf. Alia Granduchessa, Opere Milan, 1811, vol. XIII, 
p. 62), suppose, or even affirm explicitly that this first 
miracle was accompanied and followed by numerous 
others, miracles which were necessary to remedy the 
disastrous effects which the temporary immobility of 
the terrestrial planet would have produced. 

But we have to add that nothing obHges us to 
believe in this indefinite multiplication of prodigies. 
We can logically claim that the prolongation of the day 
beyond the ordinary day was only due to an optic and 
meteorological phenomenon, a local miracle propor- 
tioned for the end, and not an astronomical and univer- 
sal miracle, and thus we overcome difficulties which 
seemingly appall and dismay so many. God could have 
heard Josue without disturbing the order of our plane- 
tary system, and, consequently, without the production 
of this general perturbation w^hich would have revolu- 
tionized the entire universe. 

This interpretation of Josue's command to the sun 
to stop in its course is universally admitted to-day by 
the commentators and theologians, but it gives rise to 
a new difficulty which we must overcome. This diffi- 
culty is not only raised by Rationalists, but also by 



THE BOOK OF JOSUE AND GALILEO. 329 

the Protestants. They pretend that the Catholics are 
obliged to admit that the earth is immovable, and that 
the sun revolves around the earth, because the Church, 
infallible interpreter of the Scripture, according to our 
belief, has defined that this is the real meaning of the 
words of Josue. '' All the Catholics," says Roberts, 
" are bound to conclude from the bull Speculatores, and 
from the decrees of Popes Paul V. and Urban VIII. 
that the heHocentric doctrine is false, and that this con- 
clusion is infallibly certain" (William W. Roberts, "The 
Pontifical Decrees," etc., Oxford, 1885). 

The decrees which Roberts attributes to Paul V. 
and to Urban VIII. are decisions of the Roman congre- 
gations against Galileo, the famous Florentine astrono- 
mer. No fact of Church history has been exploited 
with such persistency and bad faith as the condemna- 
tion of this astronomer. The Church, it is stated, has 
condemned itself in the person of this illustrious victim 
of the Inquisition: either one has to acknowledge that 
she denied herself, and in this case has proved that she 
can err in interpreting the Scriptures; or one has to 
maintain against all evidence that she has not failed, 
and then all Catholics are bound to beheve in the immo- 
bility of the earth. 

Journals and reviews repeat this accusation to 
satiety. One could furnish an entire library with the 
books that have been pubHshed on this subject. It 
is, therefore, necessary to establish that it is not the 
Church that has pronounced against Galileo, but a falli- 
ble congregation, and one subject to error, so that the 
infallible authority of the Sovereign Pontiff explain- 
ing the word of God is not in question at all, and that 
there is for the Catholics no law that prevents them 



330 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

from believing that the earth revolves around the sun. 
All the authentic documents in regard to the trial and 
condemnation of Galileo are in existence to-day, and 
nothing is more easy than to obtain the truth of this 
matter in its whole integrity and simplicity. 

In the first place it is important to remeu-k that 
Galileo was not the inventor of the system which has 
made him so famous, and that the Church before him 
did not oppose herself at all to the theories of which 
Galileo made himself the propagator and defender. 

Before Galileo, in fact 500 years before our era, 
the Pythagoreans taught that the earth revolved around 
the sun. In the fifteenth century Nicholas of Cusa 
revived this opinion in Italy and upheld it publicly in 
his book, '•' De Docta Ignorantia," as the most proper 
hypothesis by which to explain the planetary system; 
not only did he not scandalize anybody, but he was 
raised to the dignity of a cardinal. About one century 
later a PoHsh canon, who had been professor at Rome, 
one of the creators of modern astronomy, Nicholas 
Copernicus (1473- 1543), revived again and taught the 
same system in his book, '' On the Revolutions of the 
Coelestial Bodies," dedicated to Pope Paul III. " The 
orb of to-day, seated on his royal throne, in the center 
of our universe," he said therein, " governs the heavenly 
family in the space around him." He protested that 
it was only in abusing the Scripture, and by interpreting 
it falsely that one could form a weapon against his 
system. He died at the time when his work came into 
existence, but nobody took offense at his opinions until 
when Galileo appeared on the scene. Nearly seventy 
years had elapsed since the death of Copernicus when 
Galileo took possession of the chair of mathematics 



THE BOOK OF JOSUE AND GALILEO. 33 1 

at Florence in 1610. The new professor taught in his 
course the mobiUty of the earth. The first writing in 
which he upheld pubhcly the system of Coper- 
nicus had for its title: " History and Explanation of the 
Solar Spots;" it appeared in 161 3, but several years 
preceding he had been attacking, with all the force 
and energy of his excitable nature, the Peripatetician 
doctrines prevailing at that time, and thus he had 
created for himself many enemies. The storm which 
formed itself against him broke loose on February 5, 
161 5. It was on the occasion of his letter to the Grand 
Duchess Christina (Cf. Opere, Milan, 181 1, vol. XIII. 
p. 17-18, 24). In this letter the author gives vent to some 
very correct statements. He does not speak otherwise 
than St. Augustine and St. Thomas; but unfortunately, 
after having promulgated correct principles, he makes 
a false appHcation of them. Indeed, he wishes to make 
use of them to defend the system of Copernicus against 
the theologians, and he does not pay attention to the 
fact that this system, in this epoch, is far from being 
evident and demonstrated. The proofs which lie gave 
thereof at that time, and later on, are very weak, as the 
savants of our days admit. They are only vain analo- 
gies, incapable of producing a reasonable convic- 
tion; hence, it is not astonishing that they did not 
satisfy men learned in the schools who opposed this sys- 
tem. 

Another letter to the Archduchess, dated December 
21, 1613, was not printed at first; only copies thereof 
were made; these circulated and produced soon in Flor- 
ence and elsewhere a great agitation. The accusations 
made against Galileo were not directed to his astronomi-^ 
cal opinions, but to his antiperipatetician propositions 



332 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

and his interpretations of the sacred text, which were 
judged as false and dangerous. 

One of the errors of Galileo was certainly to enter 
into his discussions, either by his own initiative or that 
of bad advisers, questions of theology and of sacred 
exegesis. While Bergier has gone too far when he said 
that this savant had been pursued by the Inquisition, 
" not as a good astronomer, but as a bad theologian," 
it is not less certain that, if he had been more prudent 
and more conservative, and if he had not left his domain, 
he could have avoided the rancor of which he was the 
object. But all the friends of Galileo advised him in 
vain to content himself with scientific demonstrations, 
'' without entering the domain of the Scriptures." 
While the Inquisition was wrong in condemning the 
opinion of Galileo, it was not so much on account of the 
new astronomical system he taught ; but it was the con- 
duct of the Florentine astronomer who rendered the 
judgment unavoidable. 

Galileo was denounced in the year 1615, under the 
pontificate of Paul V. to the Congregation of the Inqui- 
sition and of the Index. Both, after having examined 
his doctrine and writings, gave February 26 and March 
5, 1 61 6, two decisions, the one dogmatical, declaring 
as false and contrary to Scripture the opinion with 
regard to the immobility of the sun and to the 
mobility of the earth; the other disciplinary, for- 
bidding Galileo to teach this opinion either as abso- 
lute truth or as hypothesis. Out of regard for the 
author, the name of Galileo and the title of his works 
were not mentioned in the decree which condemned 
him; they required from him no formal retraction, and 
they imposed no penance upon him. Only they made 



THE BOOK OF JOSUE AND GALILEO. 333 

him promise not to teach any longer his opinion either 
orally or by writing. 

In the same time that they condemned GaHleo, 
March 5, 1616, the Congregation of the Index rejected 
the book, " On the Revolutions of the Heavenly 
Spheres," of Copernicus, but only with .the clause 
''donee corrigatur."' By a new decree of May 15, 
1620, the Congregation of the Index permitted express- 
ly the acceptation of the system of Copernicus under 
the sole restraining clause that it should not be taught 
as an absolute truth, but as a scientific hypothesis, and 
it authorized the reading of the work of the Polish 
savant, in which they had made some few corrections 
bearing on the passages where this astronomer seemed 
to affirm too positively his doctrines. The Sovereign 
Pontiff neither signed nor approved explicitly any of 
these acts. 

All appeared to be ended. Galileo had accepted his 
condemnation and promised without reclaim to submit 
himself to what they asked of him. However, in time 
he forgot his promises and, in diverse Memoirs which he 
published, he upheld his astronomical system in an 
indirect manner. Finally, sixteen years after his first 
condemnation, in 1632, he had published his famous 
'' Dialogo dei due Massimi Systemi del Mondo." Al- 
though in the conclusion of his work the question was 
not decided, nevertheless, in the entire course of the 
Dialogue, a certain Simplicius defended the system of 
Ptolemy by ridiculous arguments, and it was impossi- 
ble not to see in his writing an apology of the system 
of Copernicus. Indeed, this was patent. 

The publication of the '' Dialogo " was, therefore, 
a formal violation of the promises made by Galileo. The 



334 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

affair was carried to Rome, the work was examined 
and, by a decree of Jmie i6, 1633, the Congregation of 
the Index condemned this writing. Moreover, it pro- 
hibited the author to further treat on this astronomical 
question in dispute. But this was not all. A few 
days later, on June 22, 1633, the Holy Office cited the 
Florentine astronomer before its tribunal. It declared 
him suspect of heresy in having violated the agreement 
made in 1616, it obliged him to abjure his opinion, and 
condemned him to an expiatory punishment, consisting 
of imprisonment, the conditions of which should be 
determined ultimately by the judges, and in the weekly 
recitation of the Penitential Psalms for a term of three 
years. Galileo submitted. Whatever the enemies of 
the Church may have said, he was never subjected to the 
torture nor confined in the dungeons of the Inquisition; 
he received even after his condemnation a pension from 
the Pope which continued until his death. 

A month after the sentence rendered against GaHleo 
by the Inquisition, August 23, 1634, the '' Dialogue on 
the Two Systems of the World " was put on the Index 
purely and simply, that is, without indication of the 
motives. At the same time the judgment given against 
him by the Inquisition received, as well as his retrac- 
tion, a great publicity. Thus ended the important 
affair. Since 1634 we find no trace of any new con- 
demnation of the system of Copernicus. In 1757, 
imder Benedict XIV., it was decided that the prohibi- 
tion to teach otherwise except as a hypothesis the 
immobility of the sun, should be suppressed in the 
editions of the Index; nevertheless, the works anteriorly 
condemned were maintained therein, and we find them 
yet in the edition of 1819. Finally, a decree of the In- 



JEPHTE —■ IMMOLATION OF HIS DAUGHTER. 335 

quisition of September 25, 1822, approved by Pope 
Pius V II. authorized, without restriction, that the mo- 
bility of the earth might be taught by astronomers, and 
all books which had been condemned for having sanc- 
tioned the ideas of Copernicus disappeared from the 
following edition of the Index, which was printed in 

1835- 

Such are the facts. Does it follow from this that 
Catholics are obliged to believe that the real meaning 
of the passage of Josue, commanding the sun to 
stand still, is in opposition to the system of Copernicus? 
Not at all. We know that the Congregations have con- 
demned Galileo, but nothing forces us to accept as true 
their interpretation. The decree of 161 6, considered 
in itself, lacks the characters required by the Vatican 
Council for the definitions to which the Church attrib- 
utes the seal of infallibiUty. 



CHAPTER XXX. 



o 



JEPHTE AND THE I MM OLA TION OF HIS 
DA UGHTER. 

NE of the Biblical accounts most attacked is un- 
questionably the vow made by Jephte to sacrifice 
to the Lord the first living being he would meet, if he 
should be victorious over the Ammonites. We know 
that it was his only daughter that came to meet him, 
and the Bible tells that the unfortunate father executed 
the vow he had made. 

It has been always a mooted question among theo- 



336 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

logians whether or not Jepthe really iminolated his 
daughter. It does not enter into the plan of this work 
to venture a solution at the expense of the one or 
the other opinion; it is sufficient for us to show that the 
Bible is protected against all attacks, whatever the solu- 
tion adopted may be. 

Certain commentators have tried to justify Jepthe. 
Founding themselves upon the prohibition made by 
God of human sacrifices, upon the eulogy of Jepthe 
contained in the Epistle to the Hebrews, they refuse to 
suppose that the Judge of Israel, in order to obtain a 
divine favor, intended to make a vow contrary to the 
law. As to the formula itself of the vow: ''The same 
will I ofifer a holocaust to the Lord " (Judges xi, 31), 
the one interpret it thus: '' If it is a person, I consecrate 
her to the service of Jehovah, and if it is an animal 
which can be immolated, I offer it as a holocaust." 
The others, without removing themselves from the 
grammatical meaning adopted by St. Jerome, say that 
we must understand the vow of Jepthe in a figurative 
sense: To renounce, to give over to marriage, especially 
a daughter of a chief and conqueror, was a great sacri- 
fice, which Jepthe expressed by the word holocaust. 

Without endeavoring to justify these interpreta- 
tions, which at best appear less plausible than the tradi- 
tional interpretation, it is sufficient to state that rigor- 
ously they may be true, and that, consequently, nothing 
peremptory can be alleged against the Bible, in regard 
to the vow of Jepthe. 

Let us suppose now that Jepthe really did promise 
and fulfill a human sacrifice, as the traditional voice, 
as well as the violent character of the Judge and the 
Biblical account itself, would seem to indicate. What 



JEPHTE IMMOLATION OF HIS DAUGHTER. 33/ 

can we conclude from this? Only one thing: that 
Jepthe committed a crime, or rather two crimes: an 
impious vow and the execution of this vow. But the 
enemies of faith have endeavored to deduce other con- 
clusions from this account against God and the Bible. 
I. They have pretended to prove thereby that God 
authorized human sacrifices among the Jews; but, on 
the contrary, it is absolutely certain that God formally 
decreed otherwise, and that the human sacrifices 
reported in some places in the Bible were criminal in- 
fractions of the law of God. To support one's self upon 
the vow of Jepthe, to^pretend that these sacrifices were 
permitted, would be the same as if one would pretend 
that the American law permitted murder, because there 
are Americans who become murderers. 2. As to the 
Bible itself, it cannot be made responsible or considered 
an accomplice of the crime which it relates. It is true 
that it does not formally blame it, but it is not the 
custom of the sacred writers to express opinions on the 
facts they report. It is also true that St. Paul praises 
Jepthe, but he praises him solely on account of his faith, 
together with Solomon and David, without absolving 
any of these personages from their faults they might 
have committed. 

D. B.—22 



338 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 



CHAPTER XXXI. 



GEDEON AND THE MADIANITES. 

S[NCE seven years were the Israelites sighing under 
the yoke of the Madianites, when an angel appeared 
to Gedeon to tell him to dehver Israel, and God gave 
him signs of his mission (Judges iv, 37-40). The hand 
of God appeared in such a visible manner in the history 
of Gedeon that the Rationalists, enemies of the miracle, 
did not hesitate to attack its authenticity, in spite of 
the numerous details into which the author enters, 
details which are all fully in accord with what science 
teaches of the topography and the customs of Palestine 
during this epoch. All that certain Rationalists wish 
to admit is the reality of a '' signal defeat " undergone 
by the Madianites, and the honor of which is attributed 
to a powerful and rich sheik by the name of Yerouba- 
baal . . . designed by preference under the name 
of Giudeon." As to the rest, it is only a " legend, 
forged by additions, and rehandled successively." The 
sole reason which the infidel critic gives for his affirma- 
tion is that the two Madianite chiefs die in two 
different ways, in two different localities, where they 
are equally designated under two different names (vii, 
24-25; viii, 10-12). 

The objection answers itself: It would be astonish- 
ing, we admit, if the author had made these two person- 
ages die in two different manners with only the relation 
of a few events between the two deaths, if thev had the 



GEDEON AND THE MADIANITES. 339 

same names, and if they were one and the same person. 
But because they do not carry the same name it is 
quite natural to suppose that the same chiefs are not 
meant and that Oreb and Zeb could not die in the same 
manner as Zebee and Salmana. 

But when the Rationalists reject in the history of 
Gedeon everything that supposes a miracle, they are 
very careful to keep as history all that can serve them 
as pretext to attack the rehgion of the IsraeHtes: i. Ac- 
cording to the Biblical account it was an angel of the 
Lord who came to tell Gedeon to take up arms against 
the Madianites, and who promises to him the victory 
(vi, 11-24). Now, according to this narrative, Gedeon 
offers to the angel a kid and azym bread, and the 
Vulgate calls this offering by the name of sacrifice. The 
Rationahsts conclude from this that at the epoch of the 
Judges they did know neither the ceremonial rites, 
nor the Levitic priesthood, nor the unity of the sanc- 
tuary of which the Pentateuch speaks, and, hence, infer 
that this account is not authentic. But nothing hin- 
dered Gedeon to act as he did. The context requires 
that the word sacrifice must be taken here in the most 
general sense of offering. When Gedeon offered to the 
supernatural being that appeared to him a kid and 
bread, it was under the title of a gift, of a repast, and 
undoubtedly, to verify, to a certain extent, whether the 
apparition was a real one: " Give me a sign that it is 
thou that speakest to me " (vi, 17) he said to the angel, 
and it was then that he made this offering. When, 
later on, he offers a real sacrifice (vi, 2y), he did this by 
order of the Lord, and, consequently, did not need to 
feel uneasy about the fact that he did not have the Le- 
vitical power to offer sacrifice. The ceremonial laws 



340 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

having God for author, He could very well dispense 
therefrom accordingly as He pleased. 

2. Gedeon having received from his father the sur- 
name of Jerobaal (vi, 24-32), the Rationalists v^ish to 
behold in this name one of the numerous indications 
in which they pretend to find the traces of primitive 
polytheism of the Hebrews. In fact, it is sufficient 
to read the episode in question to see that this name 
indicates an aversion of the one who bore it to Baal. 

3. After the victory, Gedeon causes all the golden 
earrings, taken from the enemies, to be delivered to him, 
and later on he makes an Ephod of them, which became 
an object of idolatry for the people. It was but natural 
for the infidels to grasp this fact, and to behold again 
therein a trace of the primitive idolatry of the Hebrews, 
but in the same passage it is said that the impious wor- 
ship occasioned by the Ephod received its chastisement, 
which indicates very clearly that this was only an abnor- 
mal and accidental fall from grace. Moreover, nothing 
proves that Gedeon himself was guilty, and especially 
nothing proves that this ephod was an idol, a statue 
as the Rationalists claim, and not the sacerdotal vest- 
ment called Ephod. 

The ephod was composed of two parts, of which one 
covered the breast and the upper part of the body, 
whilst the other was hanging back of the shoulders. 
The two parts were attached together on the top of the 
shoulders by two onyxes, upon each of which were en- 
graved six of the names of the twelve tribes of Israel. 
The ephod was held together below by a golden, 
purple and linen cincture. On the ephod of the high 
priest was placed the pectoral, containing two precious 
stones, urim and thumim, of which he made use to con- 



THE BOOKS OF KINGS. 34I 

suit the Lord. As to the manner this was done, we 
cannot accuse the Hebrews of idolatry, for the ephod 
was not a statue, but a sacerdotal garment (I Kings 
xiv; xxi; xxii); it said very clearly that the priests whom 
Saul put to death, " wore the linen ephod " (xxii, 18). 
Thus, Gedeon, in making his Ephod, might be accused 
of a wrongful action, which caused the people to com- 
mit acts of idolatry, but his action in itself was not 
idolatry. 



CHAPTER XXXn. 



THE BOOKS OF KINGS, 

THE most punctilious critics cannot help but to 
acknowledge the historical value of the Books of 
Samuel or First and Second Books of Kings. '' The 
events commence to become grouped and connected," 
writes Mr. Reuss, '' the situations are sketched more 
neatly." The archaeological studies made in the Orient, 
the deciphering of the Egyptian hieroglyphics, the dis- 
covery of the monuments of Ninive and of Chaldea, 
have confirmed the exactitude of the sacred account 
to such an extent that we are enabled to verify it by 
means of documents borrowed from foreign sources. 
Hence, infidelity is obliged to render justice to the his- 
torians of the kingdom of Juda and of Israel. They 
pretend, however, to find inaccuracies in their writings. 
Moreover, they incriminate the conduct, blacken the 
character of several personages praised by the sacred 
writers. Therefore, in the first place, we have to 
answer to the accusations made against certain accounts 



342 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

of the historians of the Books of Kings and justify, in 
the second place, against the attacks, the prophets and 
princes praised in this second part of the Sacred Scrip- 
tures. 

Since all times the Books of Kings and of Parali- 
pomenons have been accused of inaccuracies; one claim 
is that the different details do not appear to harmonize 
with one another, the other objections apply to certain 
figures or to certain assertions which seem exaggerated 
and improbable. Since all times, the commentators 
have tried to reconcile the divergencies of the text and 
to explain these figures. Negative criticism has has- 
tened to collect the objections, without keeping account 
of the answers, in order to form weapons which they 
wield against the Sacred Writings. 

The Rationalists pretend to conclude from the 
divergencies one can point out in the histories of the 
Kings that they are the work of unskillful compilers, 
who, having drawn from divers sources, did not have suf- 
ficient knowledge to separate, in the different accounts, 
the true from the false, that which they should have 
preserved and that which they should have rejected; 
and, consequently, they have given us a confused and 
rehashed amalgamation of matter obtained from an- 
terior writings. In making these accusations against 
the historians of the kingdoms of Juda and of Israel, 
the objective point the infidels have is to bring them 
into discredit; they affirm that their work is wanting 
in unity, in order to maintain that it is unworthy of 
belief. All these accusations are without fcoundation 
as we are going to show. The history of the kings who 
have reigned over the people of God is related to us in 
three distinct writings, each forming a whole, which we 



THE BOOKS OF KINGS. 343 

shall study successively: i. The two Books of Samuel or 
the First and Second Books of Kings; 2. The Third and 
Fourth Books of Kings; 3. The First and Second B6oks 
of Paralipomenons or Chronicles. 

I. DIFFICULTIES DRAWN FROM THE BOOKS OF SAMUEL 
OR FIRST AND SECOND BOOKS OF KINGS. 

It is especially in the two Books of Samuel or First 
and Second Books of Kings that apparent contradic- 
tions have been discovered. The developments which 
the historian gives to his account made him return 
several times to the same subject, and he has not always 
presented it in the same Hght, considering it now under 
one aspect, now under another, and writing, besides, 
according to the Oriental fashion, that is, without 
trying to follow a rigorous and logical order, and with- 
out believing himself obliged to unite and connect in 
a consecutive manner all the parts of his account. 
He has counted on straightforward readers of good 
faith like his own, and he did not foresee malicious and 
critical interpretation. In fact he was not writing for 
modern fault finders. When one is not predisposed to 
find the Israelitic writer in fault, nothing is ordinarily 
more easy than to reconcile what at first sight appears 
to be contradictory. We must never forget, in read- 
ing the Oriental authors, that they were not acquainted 
with what we call the art of composition, and, conse- 
quently, their writings are idiomatic and replete with 
omissions which were supposed to be understood, and 
which we must supply. To do this is, indeed, anything 
but difificult. Without entering here into minute and 
elaborate examination of all the so-called difficulties, 
it will be sufficient to quote some examples, selected 



344 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

among the principal ones, to show how insignificant 
are the divergencies of which the adversaries of the 
Bibk would like to make manifest contradictions. One 
is even surprised that instructed men, who are ac- 
quainted with the peculiarities of the habits of Semitic 
writings, dare to allege in support of their thesis allega- 
tions so illogical as those which they present. 

The first of these is directed against the BibUcal 
statement of the causes which brought on the establish- 
ment of the kingdom of Israel. One of these causes was 
the old age of Samuel and the transgressions of his 
sons;^ this was evidently not the most important motive 
of the institution of the monarchy. There had been 
several others, as is always the case in political revo- 
lutions. When the Israelites desired to have a 
king, because Samuel was unable to fulfill any longer 
his functions as judge, and when they had no con- 
fidence in his children, they desired him to anoint a- 
king, so that they might be the better enabled to 
resist their enemies, and in particular the Ammonites,^ 
with whom they were too weak to combat with success, 
as long as they were divided, but whom they could, on 
the contrary, conquer easily when all their forces were 
united under one chief. The Israelitic historian men- 
tions this motive when his subject leads him to speak 
of the war; on another occasion he attributes the age 
of Samuel as a reason for the institution of the mon- 
archy. In all this there is not the least contradiction; 
only the author has not enumerated together and in a 
methodical way, the diverse causes which occasioned 
the anointing of Saul as king. 

' I Kings viii, 5. 
2 I Kings xii, 12. 



THE BOOKS OF KINGS. 345 

The account of the election of Saul gives rise to 
a similar objection. He is at first anointed king 
by Samuel by the order of God/ then he is designated 
pubhcly by lot before the assembled people,^ — the 
one does not exclude the other — finally, he is univer- 
sally recognized by all Israel after his victory over the 
Ammonites,^ because the deliverance of Jabes of 
Galaad and his triumph over the besiegers put an end 
to the partial opposition which had manifested itself 
until then against his elevation to the throne. 

The contradictions which the critic attempts to 
discover in the history of David, after his victory over 
Goliath, do not exist in fact. The young hero carries 
the head of the Philistine to Jerusalem, although it was 
only later, when he had become king,* that he became 
possessed of the fortress of Mount Sinai; but we must 
remark that when the fortress belonged still, in this 
epoch, to the Jebuseans, the city itself belonged already 
to the Israelites.^ David also, immediately after the 
combat, deposes in his tent, or in the house of his father, 
the arms of the fallen giant,^ but David places aside 
the sword which he consecrates to God and which he re- 
covers later on at Nobe.'^ Nothing is, therefore, more 
easy than to reconcile these different details and other 
similar ones. To conclude from these divergencies that 
the writer of the Books of Samuel was an ignorant com- 
piler who did not know how to make use of the material 



I Kings X, I. 

^ I Kings X, 21. 

^ I Kings xi, 15. 

* II Kings V, 9. 

^ I Kings xvii, 54. 

^ I Kings xvii, 54. 

^ I Kings xxi, 1-9. 



34^ DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

which he obtained from various sources of information, 
is to wish to obscure what is clear, to abuse and mis- 
understand the Oriental manner of writing. 

The Rationalists claim to have discovered a more 
glaring contradiction which, according to them, can be 
accounted for in no other way, except by attributing 
stupidity and falsehood to the writer. This accusa- 
tion applies to the account of the anointment by Samuel 
of the young David, and the statement of his arrival at 
the camp of Saul, preceding his combat with GoHath.^ 
When Samuel arrives at Bethlehem, the historian 
makes us acquainted with the father and the brothers 
of David,^ and a little further he presents them anew 
to the reader, as if he had never spoken of them.^ Be- 
fore the war Saul makes David, who is very brave, his 
armor-bearer,* and, when the war breaks out, we behold 
David watching his flock and going into the camp only 
by chance, in order to bring the necessaries of life to his 
brethren.^ But what is more extraordinary still, Saul 
who, before going to combat the Philistines, had chosen 
David as his armor-bearer and knew him well, and also 
his father,^ does not know the young man who felled 
Goliath.^ Such is the objection. 

We acknowledge quite willingly that a historian of 
our days would not have formulated his account as the 
Israelitic historian has done, but we must not forget 
that we have to judge a Semitic writer, and not a 



' I Kings xvi, i; xviii, 5. 

''■ I Kings xvi, 1-13. 

■^ I Kings xii, 12-16. 

* I Kings xvi, 18, 21. 
^ I Kings xvii, 17. 

* I Kings xvi, 18-22. 
' I Kings xvii, 55-58. 



THE BOOKS OF KINGS. 347 

modern writer. One of the most remarkable peculiar- 
ities of the Semitic writings, which distinguish them so 
greatly from our manner of narration, is the frequent 
repetition. The Orientals write as they speak. Now, 
all those who have traveled in the Orient know how the 
native narrators are given to repetition. We notice 
this peculiarity in all the Oriental books of these coun- 
tries. The sons of Noe are enumerated four times in 
four consecutive chapters;^ certain genealogies are 
repeated several times in the same book, for example, 
in the ParaUpomenons;^ hence, only those who are 
ignorant of this habit of the Oriental writers should 
be really surprised at these repetitions. 

The two accounts in question are besides com- 
pletely independent. The historian does not speak the 
second time of the brothers of David as if they were 
entirely unknown to us and, on the subject of David 
himself, he is careful to recall to mind that he has 
already made them known to his readers: "David," 
he says, " the son of that man of Ephrata (before men- 
tioned, explains justly the Vulgate), of Bethlehem, 
Juda."3 

But how, it is insisted, could Saul display ignorance 
of David when he had asked the latter's father to dedi- 
cate him to the royal service and be his armor-bearer?* 
And how does it come that Abner does not know him 
any more than his royal master? 

The answer is plain, and it was given by St. Ephrem 
a long time since. The King knew sufficiently well the 



^ Gen. V, 32; vi, 10; ix, 18; x, i. 

' See I Par. vii, 6-7, and viii, 1-3; viii, 29-40, and ix, 35-44, etc. 

' I Kings xvii, 12. 

* I Kings xvi, 19-22. 



348 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

shepherd of Bethlehem to attach him to his person, in 
the quality of armor-bearer and musician; but the cour- 
age of David astonishes him, and awakens anew the royal 
interest; moreover, having promised his daughter to the 
conqueror of Goliath, he desires, as a good father, more 
definite information on the character and family of the 
one who seeks to become his son-in-law, and with this 
object he charges Abner to question David.^ Nothing 
could be more natural nor more legitimate. Perhaps, 
also, the king beheld in David the one who should sup- 
plant him, as Samuel had announced to him: this is 
also a commentary of St. Ephrem.^ The persistence 
itself which Saul displays in making inquiries shows 
that the affair was to him one of no little importance, 
but of great moment, to which he attached great value. 
Hence, we have no real contradiction here, no more 
than in the other alleged inaccuracies in the First and 
Second Books of Kings. 

2. DIFFICULTIES DRAWN FROM THE CHRONOLOGY OF 
THE THIRD AND FOURTH BOOKS OF KINGS. 

The most of the difficulties which the Rationalistic 
critics bring forward against the Third and Fourth 
Books of Kings are so insignificant that they are not 
worthy of mention. One alone merits some attention. 
It applies to that drawn from chronology. 

We have already given attention to the incertitude 
of the Biblical chronology^ of the primitive times. The 
chronology of the Books of Kings is not less uncertain, 



1 I Kings xvii, 55-57. 

2 St. Ephrem, or I Kings xvii, 53. *' Opera Sjriaca," vol. 
370. 

' See Chapter ix. 



THE BOOKS OF KINGS. 349 

although circumscribed naturally within a more limited 
sphere and for different reasons. Whilst there is ques- 
tion of centuries at the beginning of the world, there is 
question here of some years; whilst the synchronisms 
are wanting in Genesis, in the Books of Kings, on the 
contrary, they are abounding; but, as we shall see, they 
aggravate the difficulty instead of solving it. One 
sole point is common to the two problems, it is, that 
figures have been altered in both. They are estabHshed 
in Genesis by the comparison of the original text with 
the ancient versions; they are manifest in the history 
of the Kings by the simple comparison of passages 
parallel with the Books of Kings and Paralipomenons. 

Already St. Jerome wrote to the priest Vitalis: 
'' Read all the Books of the Old and New Testament 
and you will find such a discord as to the number of the 
years, such a confusion as to the duration of the reigns 
of the kings of Juda and of Israel, that to try to clear 
up this question will rather appear to be the occupa- 
tion of an idle man than of a savant."^ It will be suffi- 
cient to quote an example to prove this '' confusion " 
and this " discord " of the figures. In the Fourth Book 
of Kings we read: " Ochozias was two and twenty years 
old when he began to reign," and in the Second Book 
of Paralipomenons, '' Ochozias was forty-two years 
old when he began to reign." ^ The contradiction is 
flagrant. More or less ingenious explanations have 
been ventured to reconcile these contradictions, with- 
out admitting any alteration, but none of these explana- 
tions is satisfactory, and Cornelius a Lapide was right 



^ St, Jerome, Ep. lii, 5, vol. xxii, col. 675-676. 
^ IV Kings viii, 26; II Par. xxii, 2. 



3 so DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

in saying that one of the numbers given is due to an 
error of the copyists. 

All the analogous difficulties must, undoubtedly, 
be subject to this explanation. These alterations of 
the original figures may be easily accounted for. We 
find them in all the ancient authors, and they were un- 
avoidable before the invention of printing • — which has 
not done away with them completely — when each copy 
of a book was made by hand. St. Augustine remarked 
that the numbers were generally the most defective part 
in the transcriptions. A copyist is guided by the 
general meaning when he transcribes a phrase where he 
meets a word badly written, and thus he may guess the 
real meaning, but when he finds in the text which he 
copies one or more numerals nearly illegible, in 
many cases nothing can guide him to a positive knowl- 
edge of its or their determination. The transcribers of 
the works in question doubtless met with such a diffi- 
culty in the case of Ochozias who, according to one 
account, commenced to reign when he was twenty-two 
years of age, according to another not until he was 
forty-two years of age. Who is it of those accustomed 
to writing who has not been sometimes embarrassed to 
decipher or to transcribe a numeral which he himself has 
written, but which he has badly formed? The critic has 
the right to rectify them, when he can do so, but he has 
no right to draw any conclusion from them against the 
authority and exactitude of the Sacred Books. He could 
justly accuse of error the inspired writers only in so far if 
he would find false figures in their original work, such as 
it has gone forth from their pen. Now, nothing 
authorizes us, even without keeping account of the 
divine inspiration which guaranteed against all error 



THE BOOKS OF KINGS. 351 

the authors both of the Old and the New Testaments, 
to make ascend until them the actual alterations of their 
text. 

A recent attempt has been made, it is true, to hold 
the sacred writers responsible for the contradictions 
of the dates which both the sacred and Assyrian history 
present. The Assyrian epigraphy, which has confirmed 
on so many points in a striking manner the sacred 
account, appears to disagree with the same on the sub- 
ject of chronology. The synchronisms which the two 
sources offer to us are, at first sight, irreconcilable. The 
Assyrian chronology was exactly fixed in the document 
of Nineve by means of eponyms who gave their name 
to the year like the consuls at Rome. The original 
inscriptions having come down to us, they could not 
have been altered by any transcriptions; hence, they 
merit full confidence. Now they contradict the 
accounts of the Scripture. The harmony exists in 
both as to the taking of Samaria by the Assyrians in 
the year 721 B. C; but, according to the Biblical chro- 
nology generally received, Achab, King of Israel, died 
in the year 898 or 897 B. C, and, according to the 
Assyrian chronology, he was defeated with the allied 
Kings at Karkar, by Salmanasar III., King of Ninive, 
in 854 B. C, that is, more than forty years after the 
date which we assign to his death. ^ Ozias, King of 
Israel, reigned from 809 to 758, and the inscriptions 
of Teglath Phalasar portray him engaged in war with 
this king about the year 742 or 740 B. C, or eighteen 
years after Ozias had <lied. Manahem, King of Israel, 



^ This event of the life of Achab is only known to us by the 
Assyrian documents; the Bible does not mention it. 



352 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

reigned from 770 to 759 B. C. and twenty-one years 
after the end of his reign in 738, Teglath Phatasar 
11. counts him among his tributaries. Hence, there 
can be no more formal contradiction, say the enemies 
of the Bible. 

Yes, apparently, we answer; in reality, no. The 
Assyrian chronology is in opposition to the artificial 
chronology manufactured from the Biblical texts by the 
commentators, but not with the Biblical texts them- 
selves. Not only do the Ninevite documents and the 
Israelitic documents not contradict one another at all, 
but they are perfectly in accord as to the synchronisms; 
both state that Ozias, King of Juda, and Manahem, 
King of Israel, were contemporaries of Teglath Phala- 
sar II., as Salmanasar IV., Sargon and Sennacherib 
were contemporaries of Ezechias, King of Juda. The 
Assyrian epigraphy confirms, therefore, the sacred ac- 
count, instead of contradicting it, all over where the 
alterations of figures are out of question. The discord 
exists only in the calculations made by the chronolo- 
gists. 

To understand this discord it is sufficient for us to 
recall to mind what we have said above that, on account 
of the errors of the copyists, the reigning years of the 
Kings of Israel and of Juda, are unknown to us in a 
certain manner. In admitting the years of the kings 
of Juda on the one hand, and those of the kings of 
Israel on the other, instead of finding the same total 
sum for the two kingdoms in the two calculations, from 
the time of Jeroboam, first King of Israel, to the de- 
struction of Samaria, about twenty years are wanting 
in the chronology of the kingdom of Israel. To fill up 
this gap many artifices have been employed, among 



THE BOOKS OF KINGS. 353 

others the supposition of two interreigns in Israel: the 
existence of these two interreigns does not rest upon 
any proof. Almost all the chronologists have admitted 
that we must lengthen the duration of the kingdom 
of Israel: the Assyrian chronological canons whose 
authority, contestable in some points of detail, are not so 
in their entirety, show^ that instead of adding years to 
the kingdom of Israel, we must substract the superflu- 
ous years from the kingdom of Juda. Achab and his 
successors, as well as the kings of Juda their contem- 
poraries, are somewhat less ancient than supposed. 

Hence, what is necessary to be rectified are the 
computations of the ancient chronologists. The text 
of the sacred authors does not enter into these contro- 
versies of the savants, except in one particular, which is 
within the province of critical objection, namely, that 
of the altered figures, which, however, do not affect the 
inspiration and veracity of the sacred authors, as we 
have already demonstrated. We do not need to in- 
quire here what chronological system is to be preferred. 
It is the critic who should labor to discover, by means 
of the profane synchronisms, which are the figures that 
have been altered, and thus to restore the primitive 
numbers. 

3. KING JOSIAS AND THE HIGH PRIEST HELICAS. 

The Fourth Book of Kings and the Second of 

Paralipomenons (IV Kings xxii, 8-20; II Par. xxxiv,' 

14-33), relate that in the eighteenth year of the reign 

of King Josias, the high priest Helcias discovered the 

Book of Deuteronomy in the temple of Jerusalem. The 

Second Book of Paralipomenons, in relating the same 

facts, adds only certain details, among which we 
D. B— 23 



354 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

remark the following: ''The Book of Law found by 
Helcias was the book written by Moses " (xxxv, 14)'. 
The RationaHsts do not question the main facts of the 
account we are discussing. But when infidelity, accord- 
ing to its ordinary tactics, admits the exactitude of the 
sacred account, it is to pervert it and because they 
expect to derive from it some argument against the 
traditional belief. About the middle of the last cen- 
tury, an EngHsh deist, Samuel Parvish, enunciated the 
hypothesis that Deuteronomy had been written in the 
eighth century B. C, and that it was the work of the 
skillful forger, Helcias. Even he pretended to support 
his hypothesis on the passages of the Sacred Books 
which have been indicated above. His opinion was 
welcomed by the Rationalistic critics, and a great num- 
ber of them to-day establish their theories concerning 
the origin of the Pentateuch upon the ideas of Parvish. 

Thus the infidels accept the account of the Book of 
Kings, but only because they have an object in so doing, 
and to conclude from it that Deuteronomy was written 
in this epoch and had for its author Helcias or some 
contemporary. But by what right do they consider 
this passage partly true and partly false? Why do they 
accept the testimony of the sacred author reporting 
that the Book of Deuteronomy has been really pre- 
sented to Josias, and why do they reject the testimony 
of the same writer, affirming that the Book of Moses 
was " found," and not Invented and supposed by a for- 
ger? Solely to maintain their preconceived opinions 
and to deny the antiquity of the Pentateuch. 

Every other consideration Is subordinated to this 
object which to the Infidels Is all-Important to establish. 
However, It Is certain that the Pentateuch existed 



THE BOOKS OF KINGS. 355 

before Helcias and Josias, according- to- the account of 
Kings and of Paralipomenons. In order that a book 
may be " found," it must have existed before the find- 
ing; in order that this book found should be recognized 
as the '' Book of the Law," this Book of the Law must 
have been known of before. 

But say the objectors: If the Law of Moses was 
known, why did the discovery of this book produce 
such a commotion at court, and in the city of Jerusa- 
lem? Because then they read it with attention, after 
having neglected it for too long a time during which it 
had become lost sight of. We find an analogous fact 
several centuries later on. When Esdras had read the 
Law to the people (II Esd. viii), " the assembled 
Israelites shed tears. Esdras and the Levites console 
them and encourage them to rejoice. On the next day 
they seek to understand what Esdras had read to them 
on the previous day. They study the Tliora whicl^i^e 
read, as a text that was new and unknown to them." 
It is Mr. Renan who so states. However, they knew at 
least of Deuteronomy from a very early time. Very well ! 
What occurred under Josias is not less surprising, nor 
less true than that which took place under Esdras. 
Besides it is impossible not to acknowledge that the 
Mosaic law and the history contained in the first books 
of the Pentateuch were known before Josias and Helcias. 

A convincing proof that Deuteronomy was not com- 
posed under the Kings, at the time of Josias, is that 
it contains, not one law, but several laws which would 
have no meaning 'in this epoch. Thus, the Israelites 
receive the order to exterminate Amalek after their 
taking possession of the land of Canaan. Under Josias 
Amalek had disappeared from the scene of histors^ since 



356 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

a long time (Detit. xxv, 17-19; Cf. I Kings xiv, 48; xv, 
2; xxv'ii, 8; xxx, i ; etc.). — They were also commanded 
to destroy the Canaanites, who were at that time of no 
importance, and could not have been a menace to the 
Israelites (Deut. xx, 16-18). — A law is promulgated 
against Ammon and Moab in favor of Edom. It is the 
reverse of the dispositions which reigned in Israel in 
regard to the Idumeans during the last days of the 
kings, and the descendants of Esau were regarded as 
the most implacable enemies and the most deserving 
of hatred on the part of the children of Jacob (Deut. 
xxxiii, 3, 4, 7, 8; Cf. Jer. xlviii, 47; xHx, 6, 17, 18; Ps. 
cxxxvii, 7; etc.). — The legislator who gives counsels for 
the choice of a king, supposed that the people might 
desire some day to have such. How could counsels of 
this kind have been given several centuries after the 
election of Saul? (Deut. xvii, 17-20). What is said of 
the organization of the army could not have been writ- 
ten under the domination of a king (Deut. xx, 9). — 
Funeral practices and manners of mourning, which are 
interdicted by the Law, were, on the contrary, permit- 
ted at the time of Josias and later; hence, it is not in the 
epoch of Josias that they could formulate this interdic- 
tion (Deut. xiv, 1-2; Cf. Jer. vii, 2y\ xv, 6; xli, 5). 

That Deuteronomy w^as composed only after the 
preceding books of the Pentateuch, we have also several 
proofs in Deuteronomy itself. We read therein that 
the Levites will not have heritage among their brethren, 
because Jehovah is their heritage, as "' He had told 
them." Where had He told it to them? In the Book of 
Numbers, in that part of the Law which the actual 
critic calls Elohlstic, and pretends to be posterior to 
the Captivity (Deut. xviii, 2; Cf. Num. xviii, 20-23). — 



THE BOOKS OF KINGS. 35/ 

It is prescribed to the people to preserve in the treat- 
ment of the lepers all that the priests will teach them, 
as He had commanded to them. This ordinance we 
read in two chapters of Leviticus, and nowhere else 
(Deut. xxiv, 8-9; Lev. xiii; xiv). — The Numbers ordain 
the estabhshment of six cities of refuge in the land of 
Canaan. In Deuteronomy, Moses, in order to execute 
this command, chose three to the east of the Jordan, and 
he arranges to locate the three others to the west of 
this river after the conquest of the country (Num. 
xxxv; Deut. iv, 41; xix, 1-3). — What is said of the clean 
and unclean animals in Deuteronomy presupposes 
equally what is said thereof in Leviticus. x\ll these 
facts are incontestable. Hence, it is supremely un- 
just to impute to the high priest Helcias, to Josias, or 
to other contemporaries, a fraud which they have not 
committed. 



5S' 



DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 



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xiv. 21. 
XV. 2. 
XV. 20. 

xii. 42. 
viii. 17. 
viii. 25. 
xi. and xii. 
xii. I. 
xiv. I. 

XV. 2. 

XV. 33. 

xvi. 2. 

xviii. 10. 


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CHAPTER XXXIII. 



THE PARALIPOMENONS. 

ALL the modern savants are agreed to acknowl- 
edge, in spite of some insignificant restrictions, 
the historical value of the Third and Fourth Books of 
Kings; they cannot refuse to them this justice, since the 
discovery of the Assyrian inscriptions has confirmed, 
in a manner both striking and unexpected, the exacti- 
tude of their accounts. But the infidels revenge them- 
selves on the Paralipomenons for the admission they 
are forced to make in regard to the Books of Kings. 
It would seem that, according to their ideas, abuse falls 
short of expressing the contempt which this work 
deserves. At the beginning of this century they went 
so far as to deny the good faith of the author. In more 
modern times, they pretended that the author of the 
Paralipomenons invented everything, not only the 
genealogies and the accounts which we do not read in 
the other books of the Old Testament, but also the 
title of the writings which he cites as his sources of in- 
formation. These accusations are so evidently false 
that many Rationalists of our days have refused to 
grant them their sanction. Wellhausen, however, has 
taken them up anew in his "Prolegomena zurGeschichte 
Israels " (1883, p. 178). In this work he declares that 

359 



360 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

he takes De Wette for guide, and he revives all his 
objections, in spite of the decisive answers that had been 
made to them, because he desires by all means to deny 
the Mosaic origin of the Pentateuch, and because the 
authority of the Paralipomenons is sufficient to over- 
throw his thesis of predilection, as De Wette was forced 
to acknowledge. Hence, he finds no terms injurious 
and despising enough to characterize this work: ''Its 
author mixes and confounds everything he amplifies, 
falsifies and invents." Such an account Is " a frightful 
example of the impudent Imagination of the Jews." 
Such another Is a " nonsense." 

In spite of these accusations launched against the 
Paralipomenons, when we come to the details it will 
be found that the number of the incriminated facts is 
not so considerable. We are going to examine them 
successively; we will show that it is quite wrong to re- 
proach with inaccuracies Esdras, the probable and well- 
informed author of this historical writing. 

I. THE CAPTIVITY OF KING MANASSES. 

The first and principal reproach made to the Book 
of the Paralipomenons is the account of the captivity 
at Babylon, of Manasses the King of Juda. It is affirmed 
that this is a mere fable, deserving of no credit what- 
ever. 

" Manasses seduced Juda and the inhabitants of 
Jerusalem to do evil beyond all the nations which the 
Lord had destroyed before the face of the children of 
Israel. And the Lord spoke to him and to his people, 
and they would not harken. Therefore He brought 
upon them the captains of the army of the King of the 
Assyrians, and they took Manasses and carried him 



THE PARALIPOMENONS. 361 

bound with chains and fetters to Babylon. And after 
that he was in distress, he prayed to the Lord his God, 
and did penance exceedingly before the God of his 
fathers, and he entreated Him and besought Him 
earnestly, and He heard his prayer, and brought him 
again to Jerusalem into his kingdom, and Manasses 
knew that the Lord was God."^ 

The first objection to this account is derived from 
the silence of the Books of Kings, which do not speak 
of such an important event. This objection would have 
some foundation, if the Books of Kings contained a 
complete history of the kingdoms of Juda and Israel; 
but it is well known that these books often give but a 
summary of the events, and that they refer the reader 
to more elaborate writings, as the Chronicles of the 
Kings of Juda and Israel, for amplified details, and for 
omissions in their accounts. Hence, it is not astonish- 
ing that Esdras could relate events which he derived 
from other sources, which were known to or passed in 
silence by the writer of the Kings. The existence of 
omissions in the latter work is, moreover, unquestioned 
at present. The Assyrian inscriptions have revealed 
to us several incidents of the history of Israel which 
were totally unknown to us, as the defeat of Achab at 
Karkar, the paying of tribute by Jehu to the King of 
Assyria, and divers circumstances of the campaign of 
Sennacherib against Ezechias, King of Juda. 

2. THE ANNALS OF ASSURBANIPAL. 

The annals of Assurbanipal, King of Nineve, show 
us equally well how poorly founded are all the other 
objections which are raised against the Book of Parali- 

^ 2 Par. xxxiii, 9-13. 



362 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

pomenons. The veracity of this account having been 
questioned, by a special permission of Providence, the 
cuneiform documents were brought to Hght to con- 
firm it in every particular. It has been denied that a 
" King of Assur " invaded Palestine in the reign of Man- 
asses. Assurbanipal, King of Assur, on one of his 
cylinders, states as follows: 

69. Towards Egypt and Ethiopia I directed my 

march. 

70. In the course of my expedition, twenty-two 

kings 

71. from the shores of the (Mediterranea), all 
^2. tributaries, dependent upon me, 

73. in my presence (came and kissed my feet).^ 

Another cylinder of the same monarch enumerates 
these twenty-two kings, and the second named is 
'^ Manasses, King of Juda, Minasi, sar Yahudi. The 
first statement objected to in the account of the 
Paralipomenons is, therefore, completely verified. 

One has also denied that the King of Assur com- 
pelled a monarch to stoop over and receive his fetters in 
order to lead him away into captivity. Again Assur- 
banipal verifies this sacred narrative : 

45. '' Sardludari, King of Zihinu (in Egypt) and 
Nechao (King of Memphis), they (the soldiers of Assur- 
banipal) took and with iron chains and fetters they 
bound their hands and feet."^ 

Moreover, we can still see an ancient Assyrian bas- 



^ G. Smith, " History of Assurbanipal," p. 17-18. 
' Vigououx, " La Bible et les Decouvertes Modernes," 5 edit, 
vol. IV, p. 27. 



THE PARALIPOMENONS. 363 

relief which depicts these unfortunate monarchs bound 
hands and feet. 

It is especially denied that Manasses could be led 
by an Assyrian king to Babylon, instead of being led to 
Nineve, capital of Assyria, but nothing proves better 
than this detail the exactitude of the sacred historian. 
A forger would have reasoned as do modern infidels, 
and he would never have imagined that Manasses was 
led to Babylon. But we know by the history of Assur- 
banipal that his brother, Samassumukin, whom he had 
established regent of Babylon, rebelled against him 
and dragged into his revolt a great number of tributa- 
ries of Assyria, among whom was, unquestionably, Man- 
asses. Assurbanipal crushed the insurrection at Baby- 
lon itself, he took the title as king of this city, and 
stopped therein for some time. Hence, there is nothing 
surprising in the fact that Manasses was led into this 
capital, where his conqueror must have been well 
pleased to show to the Babylonians, in the person of the 
King of Juda, how he chastises those who throw off his 
yoke. 

3. THE RESTORING OF MANASSES TO THE THRONE. 

Finally, the infidels beheve it incredible that the 
King of Assyria, after having treated Manasses so 
cruelly, should restore him to his throne. Assurbani- 
pal again answers that he gave back to Nechao, King 
of Egypt, his kingdom, although he had inflicted upon 
him the same harsh treatment that he had inflicted upon 
the King of Juda: 

61. In the place where the father had begotten me, 
at Sals. . . . 



364 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

62. had constituted upon him a kingdom. I re- 

established him. 

63. Good deeds and favors, beyond those of the 

father who has begotten me, I returned to 
and gave to him."^ 

Hence, there is not one single detail of the account 
of the Paralipomenons which is not verified by the an- 
nals themselves of the Assyrian king who lead away 
Manasses captive to Babylon. 



CHAPTER XXXIV. 



THE BOOK OF TOBIAS. 

THE Book of Tobias presents itself to us under the 
form of a real history. The author writes like a 
historian, not as an inventor of fictions. He makes 
known to us the origin of Tobias and his genealogy; 
he gives us all the chronological and geographical details 
which the historians are accustomed to give. And, 
besides, it is within a recent period that this narrative 
has not been considered historical. What really pre- 
vents the Rationalistic critics from accepting the exist- 
ence of the two Tobias, and the wonderful facts of their 
biography, is the wonderful character itself. 

According to these critics, the facts related in the 
Book of Tobias are poetic fancies. For us, on the con- 
trary, the miracle and the supernatural intercession of 

* G. Smith, ** History of Assurbanipal," p. 46. 



THE BOOK OF TOBIAS. 365 

God and His angels are no sufficient cause to deny or 
to question events which Providence had judged proper 
to surround with prodigious circumstances. 

Irrespective of the miraculous role which the angel 
Raphael plays in the journey of the young Tobias, we 
cannot allege anything against the credibiUty of the 
whole book. The miracle once admitted, all the objec- 
tions which are accumulated against the Biblical narra- 
tive solve themselves easily, provided it is remembered 
that the original text is lost, and that the versions 
which have arrived to us are more or less imperfect. 
Fortunately the diversity itself of the ancient traditions 
is a help here. It gives the means of easily overcoming 
the difficulties which have bothered the critics. The 
'' Codex Sinaiticus," Greek manuscript of the Old and 
New Testament, dating from the fourth century, and 
found on Mount Sinai, contains in particular a version, 
the contents of which are very precious. It is accord- 
ing to the text which the manuscript of Sinai produces 
that the version of Tobias in the ancient Italic was for- 
mulated and used in the Latin Church before the adop- 
tion of our actual Vulgate. 

FIRST DIFFICULTY. 

One of the most embarrassing difficulties of the 
text of the Vulgate arises from the location of the home 
of Raguel, father of Sara and relative of Tobias, at 
Rages, a city of the Medes, and nevertheless it states 
that the angel Raphael departs from the city where 
Raguel dwelt to go to Rages, in order to reclaim 
from Gabelus the money the latter owes to Tobias 
(Tob. ix, 3, 6, 8). Hence, there is here a contradiction. 
To reconcile these statements, two cities of Rages, 



366 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

both situated in Media, have been imagined; but their 
existence does not rest upon any proof. Geography- 
knows only one city of this name, that which at present 
is called Reii. It is situated at the foot of the chain of 
the Elbruz, not far from the actual site of Teheran, and 
we can still see there remains of ancient fortifications. 
To go from Assyria to Rages one has to pass Ecbatana. 
It is in this latter city, and not at Rages, that Raguel 
lived, as the Greek manuscripts teach us, and thus also 
correct with reason the faulty construction of the Vul- 
gate. 

Ecbatana, now called Hamadan, was the capital of 
Media. Founded by Dejoces and surrounded by seven 
walls of different heights and colors, it served as a sum- 
mer residence to the Achemenide kings, and later on 
to the Parthian kings. Situated in the midst of high 
mountains, its climate is very cold; the altitude of the 
city is about five thousand four hundred feet. 

FIRST OBJECTION. 

All the texts are agreed that Gabelus, the debtor of 
Tobias, Hved in the city of Rages, and it is thither that 
the angel Raphael went to collect the debt. It has 
been pretended that the sacred writer had committed 
an error, and that in the epoch in which he places Tobias, 
about 700 B. C., Rages had not yet come into existence, 
because Strabo reports that this city was built by 
Seleucus Nicator, a long time after the death of Tobias, 
that is, 300 years B. C. The objection is not well taken. 
Strabo expresses himself Improperly, he means to say 
that Seleucus rebuilt and repaired the city of Rages. 
The proof that the Greek geographers understood it 



THE BOOK OF TOBIAS. 367 

thus, is that he states that Seleucus substituted for the 
ancient name of Rages that of Europos (Strabo xi, 13). 
Besides we have positive assurances of the existence of 
Rages before the epoch of Seleucus. Alexander the 
Great sojourned therein five days in 331 B. C, about 
thirty years before Seleucus ascended the throne. The 
Zend-Avesta mentions it as a very ancient city, and 
Darius, son of Hystaspes, names it in his inscriptions. 

The distance from Ecbatana to Rages is consider- 
able. Arien states that Alexander, pursuing Darius, 
reached Rages on the eleventh day after his leaving 
Ecbatana. A traveler of our day who knows these local- 
ities well, Madame Dieulafoy, writes: ''The distance 
from Teheran (Rages) to Hamadan (Ecbatana) is about 
sixty farsaks or parasangs, that is, about three hundred 
miles. A caravan composed of strong horses or mules, 
makes each day six farsaks; the camels, under the same 
conditions make from four to five forsaks. From 
Teheran to Saneh, on horseback, it required three days 
and a half for us to make the twenty-two farsaks which 
separate these two cities. If the beasts could have con- 
tinued this gait,we would reach Hamadan in nine days, 
but there is no Persian camel which could have followed 
us. My impression is that Alexander, pursuing Darius, 
must have hastened his march with remarkable rapidity 
in order to have passed over the country embraced 
between Ecbatana and Rages in eleven days, the terri- 
tory being very uneven and interspersed in places with 
high mountains. It may have been that the conqueror 
advanced with a selected troop, and left to his lieuten- 
ants the care of the main body of the army who were led 
onward by a less fatiguing route " (Letter of Januarv 
31, 1889). 



368 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

SECOND OBJECTION. 

The angel Raphael, traveling with camels and servants 
(Tob. ix, 6), must, therefore, have needed more than 
twenty days to go from Rages and to bring back Gabe- 
lus. They have made the attempt to draw from the 
length of this voyage another objection against the 
sacred account: they suppose that the writer ignored 
the distance between these two cities; but this supposi- 
tion is without foundation, for the most of the texts, 
and in particular the Vulgate (Tob. ix. 6), do not indi- 
•cate what was the duration of the journey. The critics 
have desired, it is true, to fix its length, indirectly, by 
stating that the marriage feasts continued only two 
weeks (Tob. viii, 23), that they had commenced before 
the departure for Rages, and that they were not yet 
ended on the arrival of Gabelus and, that, consequently, 
the voyage of the angel had taken less than fourteen 
days. Now, the Sacred Text does not prevent the 
supposition that the feasts were retarded In order that 
Raphael and Gabelus could participate In them, and It 
insinuates that the absence of Tobias lasted longer than 
it would have If he had gone to Rag-es (Tob. x, i) with- 
out stopping for his marriage with the daughter of 
Raguel. His father-in-law did all he could to prolong 
his sojourn at Ecbatana. and thev celebrated probably 
the solemn feasts only after the return of Raphael to 
Rages. 

3. ANACHRONISM. 

The Greek text, as published In the ordinary editions, 
furnishes matter for other objections, which are all 



THE BOOK OF TOBIAS. 369 

answered by the " Codex Sinaiticus." We read in the 
conclusion of Tobias (Tob. xiv, 10) an allusion to the 
history of Esther and Aman. The old Tobias remem- 
bers as a past event the persecution which Achiacharus^ 
(Assuerus) waged against the Jews. This is clearly an 
anachronism, because the events reported in the Book 
of Esther occurred only long after the death of Tobias. 
The " Codex Sinaiticus," as also our Vulgate, does not 
speak of Aman; hence it is because of an error that we 
read his name in the Septuagint. 

As for Achiacharus, in whom the critics pretend to 
behold Assuerus, King of the Persians, becaues he is 
named with Aman, it is in reality Cyaxares, King of 
Media, the conqueror and destroyer of Ninive. The 
text of Sinai is very precise and very exact on this point. 
It says in the final verse: " And (Tobias the son) before 
his death learned yet the ruin of Ninive, and he saw 
the prisoners who were led to Media, and who had been 
taken by Achiacharus, King of the Medes " (Tob. xiv, 
15, Codex of Sinai). 

The latter passage has been also altered in the printed 
form of the Septuagint. It gives rise to a new objec- 
tion, in substituting wrongfully the better known name 
of Nabuchodonosor (Tob. xiv, 15, Septuagint) for 
that of Cyaxares. "And (Tobias) heard relating, before 
his death, the capture of Ninive which was effected by 
Nabuchodonosor and Asyerus." — Nabuchodonosor may 
have assisted in the ruin of Ninive, in the army of his 
father Nabopolassar, ally of Cyaxares, but the taking 
of the capital of Assyria cannot be attributed to 
him. The " Codex Sinaiticus " corrects this error 
which was entered into the printed texts of the Greek 
version. 

D. B.— 24 



370 ^ DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

4. THE DEMON ASMODEUS. 

All the texts speak of the demon Asmodeus, and 
what they state of him appears incredible or even absurd 
to the Rationalistic critics. They say, in the first place, 
that it is a borrowing from Mazdeism. — It is possible 
that the name was borrowed, indeed, from the Maz- 
dean behef, by the writer of Tobias who lived in Media, 
but '' if this were the case, it was only the name that 
was interpolated, for the Biblical demon personifies im- 
purity," which does not represent at all, " the Ashmo 
dceva, the deva Aeshma, of the Avesta." Besides, the 
borrowing is far from being demonstrated, and the simi- 
larity between Asmodeus and Ashmo dseva may be 
purely gratuitous, as this naming of the demon is 
readily explained in Hebrew, when it is understood as a 
derivation from the root samad, ''the one who destroys," 
a terminology which is precisely equivalent to our famil- 
iar expression '' the spirit of perdition." 

But, whatever there may be as to the origin of the 
name of Asmodeus, that what is more important is 
the conduct of the demon. He, who is a spirit, loves a 
woman. He is expelled by the odor emitted from the 
burned liver of a fish, and is driven into a desert of 
Upper Egypt. How can anyone fail to recognize in 
all this anything more than a mere fable? ask the infi- 
c^els. — In the first place the sacred writer does not state 
that Asmodeus loved Sara, daughter of Raguel; it is 
Tobias, the son, who, in the Greek text (the Vulgate 
does not mention it) comes to this conclusion, because 
he had learned that the demon had caused the death of 
the seven husbands of Sara. Now, this conclusion 
was not correct, for it follows clearly from the words of 



THE BOOK OF JUDITH. 37 1 

Raphael to the young Tobias that the first husbands 
of the daughter of Raguel were stricken by the demon 
only on account of their incontinence (Tob. vi, 16-18). 

In the second place, when it is said that Asmodeus 
is driven away by the smoke of the burning of a fish's liver 
(viii, 2), this signifies not that the Hver had this virtue 
in itself, but that God contributed this virtue to this 
material object, as He has given to the baptismal water 
the power to drive away the demon. Finally, when it 
is said that Asmodeus is bound in the desert of Upper 
Egypt (viii, 3), this phraseology must be understood 
simply, according to the explanation given by St. 
Augustine, in the sense that '' his power to do injury is 
taken away from him by the angel " Raphael, and that 
he was removed from the family of Tobias and Raguel, 
and banished to a place outside of which it is forbidden 
him to exercise his malevolent power. 



CHAPTER XXXV. 



THE BOOK OF JUDITH. 

SINCE Luther, who declared that the Book of 
Judith was not historical, the Protestants, except 
a few, have adopted his opinion. A very small number 
of Catholics, notably Jahn, Movers and Scholz, have 
followed the opinion of Protestants. 

According to Movers, the author of the Book of 
Judith desired to give to his brethren the following 



372 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

lesson: ''As long as the Jewish people will remain 
faithful to God they will be capable of resisting the most 
powerful nations of the earth. In order to render this 
more sensible he had to represent a dreadful enemy of 
the Jews in an epoch when the people of Jehovah were 
still faithful and devoted to Him. Since the history 
of the past did not ofifer anything similar in his own 
countr}^, he borrows, from the period anterior to the 
Captivity, the conquering Nabuchodonosor, such as the 
Book of Daniel depicts him, and he represented the 
Jewish people such as it had become at the return from 
Captivity." 

A. Scholz, in a lecture deUvered November ii, 1884, 
before the Historic-Philological Society of Wurzburg, 
denied also the historical character of Judith. Accord- 
ing to him this book is certainly inspired, but it is not 
a history, it is a prophecy. The events which it relates 
are impossible, and, moreover, there is no moment of 
sacred history wherein we can place them; they cannot 
have fulfilled themselves either in Josias, under age, 
or during the captivity of Manasses. The confusion 
of personal and geographical names is such that one 
cannot help to believe that it was done intentionally 
on the part of the author, who otherwise appears 
to have been a well instructed man. Judith is the Israel 
of the New Testament, the Christian Church, widow 
and without children. Achior (brother of the light) 
is the converted Gentile; Bethulia, the house of God 
and the Holy Land; the return from Captivity is the 
conversion to the faith; the campaign of Holophernes 
is the campaign of Gog in Ezechiel; Israel-Judith 
triumphs, with the help of its God, over all its enemies. 
This prophecy was written in the time of Seleucid kings. 



THE BOOK OF JUDITH. 373 

It is true that the Book of Judith, as Scholz main- 
tains, might be inspired, even if it were no real history, 
but tradition considers _this writing not only inspired, 
but regards it also as historical. This is the teaching 
of the Fathers. Until Luther, the unanimity has been 
complete and, in spite of the discordant voices since that 
time, the CathoHc theologians of our days admit, like 
formerly, that Judith did really exist. Therefore, we 
can still say, with Richard Simon, that this " is the most 
general and the most approved opinion." It is certain 
that the author gives us his account as a real and true 
one, because, to quote only two characteristics, he 
assures us that the descendants of Achior Hved in his 
time among the Jews^ and that they also celebrated in 
his epoch an annual feast in commemoration of the 
victory of Judith. Consequently, one can contest his 
testimony only in so far as one would be capable of dis- 
covering in his account proofs of the fictive character 
one wishes to attribute to him. Let us now inquire 
whether the objections they bring forward against this 
book are sufihcient to destroy the traditional belief. 

I. PRETENDED HISTORICAL AND GEOGRAPHICAL ERRORS. 

The main accusation made against the Book of 
Judith is that it is replete with historical and geograph- 
ical errors. 

It is certain, and acknowledged by all, that the text 
offers in this respect real difficulties, but we must 
remark that we meet with similar difficulties in all the 
ancient writings, where, as in this case, the proper 
names have been frequently disfigured and altered, so 

^ Judith xiv, 6 (Vulgate) ; xiv, lo (Greek text). 



374 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

that we cannot draw any legitimate conclusion against 
the reaUty of the facts which they relate. In the Book 
of Judith, the difificulties of this kind are quite numer- 
ous, because the quantity of the proper names, of both 
men and places, which are enumerated therein, is con- 
siderable. To recognize the primitive reading is 
sometimes, but not always possible. The original text, 
which, by general consent, was Chaldean or Hebrew, 
is lost. The different versions, Greek and Latin, which 
descended to us, all contain errors, and are not in accord 
with one another. More than once it happens that the 
correct name of a place is not given. Thus, the city 
of Tarsus, in CiUcia, has become in the Vulgate Tharsis, 
in Spain; in the Greek it is even less discernible, for here 
it has been transformed into Rassis^ ; the river Chaboras 
has transformed itself in the Greek into Abrona, and 
in the Vulgate into Mambre^; the river Eulseus, pre- 
served exactly in the Syrian version, is known in the 
Vulgate under the name of Jadason, and in the Greek 
it takes a false name, that of another river, the Hydas- 
pes.^ Certainly, we can regard as errrors all these 
names changed or altered, but they are errors for which 
the copyists alone are responsible, and we have no right 
to impute them to the original author. Even the 
diversity of names in the different versions proves that 
the cause of these errors is the geographical Ignorance 
of those who have transcribed them. All the false 
geographical denominations which we can point out 
in the Book of Judith detract, therefore, nothing from 
historical reality. 



* Judith ii, 13. 

2 Judith ii, 24 (Greek text); ii, 14 (Vulgate). 

3 Judith i, 6. 



THE BOOK OF JUDITH. 37$ 



2. THE SITE OF BETHULIA. 



It is claimed, it is true, that there is a geographical 
name, the most important of the account, that of 
Bethulia, which could not have been altered, and which 
alone is sufficient to establish that all is fictitious in 
Judith: both the personages and the facts, because this 
city itself, the site of which has never been discovered, 
is a pure fiction. 

It is not at all demonstrated that Bethulia is a pure 
fiction. Several modern savants have identified it with 
Sanur, and this opinion has found a good deal of favor; 
but whether the identification be correct or not, it is 
incontestable that there were in Palestine other cities, 
the sites of which are completely unknown, but the 
existence of which is admitted beyond question. Beth- 
ulia, it is said, is named nowhere else in the Scripture. 
Undoubtedly, but neither are Nazareth, Capharnaum, 
Bethsaida and Corozain, named in the Old Testament, 
but appear only in the New. There are even localities 
like Bether, the mention of which we never read either 
in the Old nor in the New Testament. (According to 
Renan, Bether would be the BethuHa of the Book of 
Judith.)^ The savants themselves are not in agreement 
as to the situation of this place; thus, some place Bether 
in Juda, southwest of Jerusalem; others place it in 
Samaria; nevertheless nobody maintains that Bether 
never existed and that the false Messias, Barkochebas, 
did not hold out there durino: three years, against the 
Roman legions, in the reign of Trajan (135). In reaHty, 
the geographical descriptions of the Book of Judith are 



E. Renan, " Les Evangiles " p. 26. 



376 ■ DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

very correct, even for the most remote countries of 
Palestine, when the ancient documents furnish to us 
the means to verify them. It is thus that the descrip- 
tion of Ecbatana, given by the Israehtic author is con- 
firmed by that which we read in the Zend-Avesta: 

" Arphaxad," the Book of Judith tells us, ^'sur- 
rounded Ecbatana with stone walls, the stones of which 
were three cubits wide and six cubits long, and he raised 
the walls to a height of seventy cubits, and their thick- 
ness was fifty cubits. He flanked the towered gates 
one hundred cubits high; their foundation was sixty 
cubits wide. He also constructed gates: they arose to 
a height of seventy cubits, for the exit of his troops and 
for putting his foot soldiers into battle order." ^ 

Behold now the description of Ecbatana in the 
Zend-Avesta. Zemschid, it is said there, " raised a Var 
or fortress suiliciently large, built of hewn stones; here 
he gathered a numerous population and supplied the 
surroundings with troops for their use. From the 
large fortress he caused water to flow in abundance. 
In the Var or fortress he raised a magnificent palace, 
surrounded by walls, and divided into several distinct 
divisions; there was no elevated point therein, neither 
in the front nor back of it, which could command and 
dominate the fortress."^ The two texts, while express- 
ing themselves in quite a different manner, are agreed 
in substance. 

3. HISTORICAL DIFFICULTIES. 

The geographical difficulties alleged against the 
Book of Judith do not prove, as we have seen, that this 

1 Judith i, 2-4. 

2 Cf. De Harlez, " Avesta," vol. i, p. 96-98. 



THE BOOK OF JUDITH. 377 

book is a fiction. The historical difficuhies do not 
furnish a better proof. A first objection is made to the 
passage last quoted, in which it is said that Arphaxad, 
King of the Medes, surrounded Ecbatana with walls. 
Now, no king of the Medes seems to have borne this 
name. 

Arphaxad is very probably Phraorte, whose name 
may be still recognized in its Hebrew dress. The kings 
of Media bore Turanian names, the pronunciation and 
formation of which were quite different from those of 
Semitic and Aryan languages; from this it followed that 
the transcriptions of the names in the foreign idioms 
have altered and changed them considerably. The 
Cyaxares of the Greeks is called in the Behistun in- 
scription Uvakhsatara and, according to Ctesias, he 
called himself Astibaras. We see in this case that the 
modifications of the proper names in Scripture are not 
such an extraordinary fact as one might believe at first 
sight. The Persian form of the name of Phraorte 
was Fravartis. In the Babylonian (Semitic) text of the 
Behistun inscription, he is called Parruvartis, and in the 
Medic text Perruvartis. In Diodor of Sicily, he has 
become Artynes. The Semitics could not pronounce 
two initial consonants without the help of a vowel inter- 
calated between these two consonants, like Parruvatis, 
or placed before the first consonant, as in Ahasveros 
(Assuerus), a name of Chschaarscha (Xerxes), which 
explains to us the a placed at the head of Arphaxad. 
The name of Arphaxad being known in the Hebrew 
language, the name of Phraorte under its Persian or 
Medic form of Fravartis or Parruvartis, could easily 
become Aphravartis, Arphavartis, Arphaxad, because 
we are naturally inclined to approach an unknown 



3/8 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

name to a known name, as we had already occasion to 
remark. 

4. ASSURBANIPAL, THE NABUCHODONOSOR OF JUDITH. 

Phraorte, successor of Dejoces on the throne of the 
Medes, reigned twenty-two years, from 657 to 635, 
before our era. Thus, he was contemporary with the 
King of Ninive, Assurbanipal, who reigned from 668 
to 625. Assurbanipal is therefore the Nabuchod- 
onosor of the Book of Judith, who sent his general 
Holofernes for the conquest of Occidental Asia. The 
campaigns of this Assyrian general are related in the 
first chapters of the Book of Judith. They have crit- 
icised these chapters from a literary standpoint, on the 
charge of irrelevancy and prolixity. This is of little 
importance. The author wrote a history, not a fiction; 
he describes the events as they took place without 
troubling himself to satisfy the impatience of the 
reader by eliminating the details, which, from a literary 
standpoint, are uninteresting; a romancist should con- 
sult only the art; a historian must seek above any other 
consideration to tell the truth. 

It is true that all these wars attributed to Holo- 
fernes seem very improbable, and even incredible. It 
is easy, however, to show that this is a false judgment. 
We are in possession of the originals of the annals of 
the reign of Assurbanipal, the King of Assyria, who, 
according to all probability is, as we have seen, the 
Nabuchodonosor who placed Holofernes at the head 
of his army. Now, in his annals we recover the account 
of all the campaigns of which the Book "of Judith speaks. 
Assurbanipal had combated the Medes in the first 
years of his reign. His dominion extended over the 



THE BOOK OF JUDITH. 3/9 

whole territory from Asia Minor to Egypt inclusively. 
This is attested by both his inscriptions and the Sacred 
Text. Manasses was then King of Juda, and one of 
the tributaries to the Assyrian monarch. Having re- 
volted against him, Manasses is made prisoner and led 
away captive to Babylon, as related in a previous 
chapter.^ But this prince was not the only one that 
had revolted. All those whom the King of Ninive had 
subdued, on from Lydia and Cilicia to the shores of the 
Nile, had thrown off the yoke of Nabuchodonosor. As- 
surbanipal's own brother, Samassumukin, who governed 
Babylonia, had kindled the fire of the revolt to gain his 
own independence. The Assyrian king, as he himself 
relates, and as we behold him in the Book of Judith, 
desires his former vassals to expiate their revolt, and 
he undertook to subdue in person, or through his 
generals, all the countries that had refused to pay him 
tribute: Cilicia, Lydia, Syria, and the neighboring coun- 
tries of the Mediterranean. He made the conquered 
peoples undergo the same treatments as those which are 
mentioned in the Book of Judith. Finally, and this is 
a very important and significant detail, after having 
undertaken the war in order to reduce Egypt under his 
obedience, he speaks no longer of this kingdom: certain 
proof that he could not lead this enterprise to a triumph- 
ant conclusion, and indirect confirmation of what we 
read in the sacred author concerning the disaster which 
annihilated in Palestine the army of Holofernes, who 
had been ordered to reconquer Egypt. It is impossible 
not to be struck with the accord which exists between 
the Hebrew document and the cuneiform inscriptions. 
How many accounts are there whose historical value 

^ Cf. Chapter xxxii. 



380 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

is not contested, that are less solidly established than 
that of the Book of Judith? 

5. ANACHRONISMS. 

However, we are not yet done with the objections 
raised against the history of the war of Holofernes. 
Many anachronisms, it is claimed, are found in the text ; 
the author names the Sanhedrin {geroiisia),^ the vigils 
of the Sabbath, and the Neomenioe.^ Now, the institu- 
tion of the Sanhedrin dates only from the third or 
fourth century B. C, and the vigils of the Sabbath and 
the Neomenise were regarded not as feasts until a much 
later period. Consequently the Sanhedrin and the 
vigils did not exist in the time of Judith. 

Certainly, the Sanhedrin is posterior to the epoch 
in which this history takes place, but the text does not 
make any allusion to it. When it employs the word 
gerousia, one of the names which designate that assem- 
bly in the language of the Hellenist Jews, the sacred 
historian employs it in a different sense, namely, mean- 
ing the ancients of the people. This expression has 
often this sense in the version of the Septuagint, and it 
has also this meaning in Judith, as the Vulgate has 
rendered it.^ As to the vigils of the Sabbath and the 
Neomenise, nobody can affirm that these were unknown 
in the time of Judith, because nobody knows in what 
epoch their observance originated. It is nevertheless 
probable that the original text did not speak thereof, 



^ Judith iv, 8; xi, 14; xv, 8 (Greek text). 
2 Judith viii, 6 (Greek text). 

^ Lev. ix, 3; Exod. iii, 16, 18; iv. 29; xii, 21; Num. xxii, 4; 
Deut. V, 23, etc. 



THE BOOK OF JUDITH. 38 1 

for there is no mention made of them in our Latin trans- 
lation, which enumerates only the Sabbaths and the 
Neomenise (Judith viii, 6). 

6. DISCOURSE OF ACHIOR. 

The final objection made against the Book of 
Judith is derived from a passage of the discourse of 
Achior, Avhere it is said that the inhabitants of Juda 
have returned from Captivity, after having been led 
into a foreign land, and after their temple had been pro- 
faned.^ This passage evidently refers, it is claimed, 
to the Babylonian Captivity, which, however, did not 
occur until after the events related in Judith had hap- 
pened. 

Nothing proves that the Sacred Text makes allusion 
to this. We have seen that King Manasses was led 
away captive into Babylon; certainly he was not the 
only one that was thus led away, but a certain number 
of his subjects were also transported, according to the 
invariable custom of the Assyrian kings as recorded by 
the inscriptions. Several of these captives could receive 
permission to return into their country, as it was 
granted to Manasses himself. As to the profanation 
of the temple, there is no reason to be surprised from 
what we know of the character of the King of Ninive; 
however, we must remark that the Latin translation 
states nothing of this; the expressions which the Greek 
translation employs are very obscure and, moreover, 
we cannot determine whether Achior had an exact 
knowledge of the events he relates, so that we have no 
assurance that his narrative is true in all its details. 



Judith V, 18-19 (Greek text); 22-23 (Vulgate), 



382 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 



7. THE HEROINE JUDITH. 

We have only one more observation to make on 
the Book of Judith. This heroine was remarkable for her 
piety and chastity, as well as for her courage which was 
far beyond that usual to her sex. We must, however, 
admit that several of her acts were not at all praise- 
worthy. The ineans which she employed to deliver 
her people cannot be approved without reserve. She 
deceives Holofernes with falsehoods, and when these 
falsehoods may be justified by the good faith in the 
mouth of Judith, they are not inexcusable in themselves. 
As to the legitimacy of the murder of the Assyrian 
general it is dif^cult to render judgment from our point 
of view. According to the ideas of the time, it was cer- 
tainly an heroic act. The employment of stratagem 
and violence to overcome an enemy is not considered 
demeaning in the eyes of the Orientals. Besides, the 
magnificent patriotism which inspired the courageous 
act of the widow of Bethulia, would command the 
greatest admiration among any people, in any land, in 
any epoch. Those souls who have imbrued their hands 
in blood always form an exception, and often we cannot 
help admiring them, although we cannot always ap- 
prove of their acts. The infidels make it a cause of 
reproach to her historian in praising her without re- 
serve. Divers Catholic interpreters, who justify it 
without restriction, have believed like them that the 
Sacred Text approved in everything the conduct ot 
Judith. But the language of the Scripture is not so 
expressive as one has supposed sometimes. The 
praises given by St. Paul to Samson and to Jephte, for 



THE BOOK OF ESTHER. 383 

example, are no approbation of their lives, which have 
not been irreproachable in everything; what is said to 
the glory of Judith does not imply the justification of 
all the means which she employed to deliver her so 
hardly oppressed people. It is this what St. Thomas 
teaches expressly in his '' Summa Theologica."^ The 
sacred authors have praised the good intentions, and 
the acts worthy to be approved; from this, however, 
it does not follow at all that the precious metal did not 
contain some alloy. 



CHAPTER XXXVI. 



THE BOOK OF ESTHER. 

THE Book of Esther finds no mqre grace in the eyes 
of the negative critic than Tobias and Judith. It 
is presented to us as an historical book: the events take 
place at the court of Xerxes, in his capital, the city of 
Susa; but this matters Httle in regard to the Rational- 
ists. For them this book is a " parable, a superabundant 
testimony of the Jewish pageantry and arrogance." 
Mr. N'oeldeke, after having affirmed that '' this book 
is, in all its parts, void of any historical value," is 
forced to contradict himself and make the following 
avowal: "Does this account rest upon any historical 
foundation? We are unable to answer with certitude. 
The Ahasveros (Assuerus) would seem to indicate this; 
one is agreed to acknowledge him as identical with 

* Cf. 2a 2, q, no, a. 3, ad. 3 um. 



384 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Xerxes. It is quite possible that he admitted into his 
harem a Jewess, named Esther, and that she acted in 
favor of her people."^ 

When all this is possible, why deny the historical 
character of the book? One alleges the improbabili- 
ties. But a fact is not always true because it is proba- 
ble, and it is not always false because it is improbable, or 
even incredible. 

1. ESTHER, THE WIFE OF KING XERXES. 

The objection which all the Rationalists produce 
is as to how " Esther, having become the wife of the 
king, could conceal for so long a time her origin from 
the court, the king and Aman himself." But wherever 
polygamy is practiced, they do not attach any great 
importance to the origin of a woman. How many 
inhabitants are there of harems whose birth and lineage 
are unknown, and even could not be ascertained if such 
were the desire. Besides Mardocheus had advised 
Esther not to reveal that she was a Jewess, and when 
Assuerus had the curiosity to inquire who she was, the 
young queen being orphaned quite early in life, having 
been born in Persia, speaking the language of the coun- 
try, given a Persian name, and the tutor who had raised 
her, a Babylonian name, it was very easy for her to dis- 
similate her nationality and to answer without betray- 
ing her secret all the questions propounded by her royal 
husband. 

2. THE DELAY OF AMAN'S VENGEANCE. 

It is equally incredible, the Rationalists add, that 
Aman delayed his vengeance for eleven months; the 

^Th. Noeldeke, " Literarische Geschichte des Alten Testa- 
mentes." 



THE BOOK OF ESTHER. 385 

vindictive spirit is not so patient. '' How can we believe 
that if the Persian despot, even gained by a favorite, 
had formed the project to annihilate all the Jews of his 
kingdom, he would have caused this to be announced 
publicly in all the provinces of his kingdom to all the 
peoples, and not secretly to his governors, twelve 
months before the execution? " The text gives us the 
explanation of this delay. The Persians were very 
superstitious; they beheved in lucky and unlucky days — 
in our time there are many who believe the same. 
Aman, therefore, consulted the fate during the first 
month of the twelfth year of Xerxes (473), in order to 
know what would be the most propitious moment for 
the execution of his design, and the oracle designated 
to him the twelfth month. Hence, he was obliged to 
wait eleven months (Esther HI, 7). It v/as thus that 
Providence permitted to reveal its protection to the 
chosen people. 

But, they insist, in this case why did he pubHsh the. 
edict such a long time before? To prevent the king 
from revoking his word; to excite, undoubtedly, the 
cupidity of the nations subject to the Persians and to 
increase the antipathy of the enemies of the Jews, — 
finally, to render more easy the execution of the 
measure. 

But this was, they say, providing the condemned 
with the means to escape the bloody measure taken 
against them. It was not so easy for them to leave the 
Persian Empire, which covered an immense territory; 
they could not take refuge in Palestine, because this 
was a province of the great king. If, besides, some suc- 
ceeded in finding a refuge, Aman, perhaps, desired this, 
for they were obliged to abandon their goods and thus 

D. B.— 25 



386 . DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

furnish to the favorite the means to pay Assuerus the 
ten thousand talents which he had promised him. 

3. THE IMMENSE NUMBER OF THE DEAD. . 

It is not less incredible, again say the RationaHsts, 
that when the king, repenting of his order and refusing 
nevertheless to withdraw it, had authorized the Jews 
by a second edict to defend themselves against the 
enemies who would attack them, this second edict could 
have for consequence to cause to perish in aU the coun- 
tries where there were Jews, seventy-five thousand men 
equally subjects of the king. 

The number of the dead is not " incredible " for an 
empire which extended from India to Ethiopia. In 
a much smaller kingdom, Mithridates caused the killing 
of eighty thousand Romans in one day. 

In supposing, they continue, that the royal governors 

• through fear of the new royal favorite, Mardocheus, 

only protected the Jews, they could not assist them, 

however, in an efficacious manner, because the first 

edict had not been reported. 

The effect of the second edict must have restrained 
all the chief citizens from attacking the Jews, in order 
not to incur the anger of the king and of Mardocheus. 
Nothing prevented the Persian satraps and officers from 
upholding secretly, or even publicly, those who were 
then in favor at the court. It is even difficult to ex- 
plain a similar objection, for who does not know of the 
servility which an Oriental functionary is capable of 
in order to please those who can procure him advance- 
ment or, at least, have power to keep him in office? 
Personal interest removes all scruple, and it is not the 



THE BOOK OF ESTHER. 387 

first degree annulled by a second, which could have 
paralized official ambition and obsequiousness. 

Again they say, it is contrary to nature, that, when 
the Jews had killed, on the day when the first royal 
edict ordained their death, five hundred of their enemies 
in the city of Susa, the king could listen to the prayer 
of Esther, who, insatiable for blood and vengeance, im- 
plored him to issue another edict authorizing to con- 
tinue the massacre, since it was no longer permitted 
to attack the Jews. 

It was no longer legally permitted to attack the 
Jews, but those of their enemies who had not perished 
undoubtedly formed the project to make them expiate 
on the following day, when they expected that they 
could strike them with impunity, for the murders com- 
mitted on this day. It was in order to foil this calcula- 
tion that Esther interceded anew at Assuerus. We are 
far from pretending that in this the queen acted with an 
evangelical kindness, but she was a woman of her time, 
she shared its ideas and habits and, as we have observed 
for Judith, while everything in her conduct is not 
praiseworthy, one cannot at least refuse to render 
homage to her patriotism, and admire her devotedness 
to her people. Thus, none of the alleged objections 
of the negative critic against the sacred account has any 
value. 

4. THE FACTS JUSTIFIED BY HISTORY. 

But not only are the objections of the RationaHsts 
without force, but all the facts can be verified by history. 
All that is said about the ostentation and the magnifi- 
cence of the Persian kingfs, of their palaces and their 
gardens, is confirmed by the ancient authors and by the 



388 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

excavations executed at Susa itself. All the depic- 
tures of the character of Assuerus or Xerxes (485-472 
B. C.) are equally confirmed by the most unexception- 
able historical testimonies. Herodotus and Plutarch 
present him to us in the same light as the sacred 
writer, that is, a whimsical, fantastic and extravagant 
monarch. He strikes with rods and ties with chains 
the Hellespont, because a storm had carried off the 
bridge of boats, which he had built over the sea.^ He 
writes a letter to Mount Athos to forbid it from rolling 
stones upon his soldiers.^ The one who has committed 
such acts of folly is very well capable of all that the 
Book of Esther attributes to him. This book does 
not ascribe to him such senseless actions. Herodotus 
tells us, moreover, Hke the Hebrew historian, that the 
empire of Assuerus extended from India to Persia,^ and 
that in his army they counted over sixty dififerent 
nations.^ Finally, Herodotus indirectly confirms the 
Biblical account of the feasts which were celebrated 
at Susa, and which resulted in the repudiation of Vasthi, 
followed by the elevation of Esther to the dignity of 
Queen. In 482 B. C, after having conquered Egypt, 
Assuerus assembled at Susa all the principal chiefs of 
the empire and deliberated for a long time with them 
in regard to the expedition he projected against 
Greece.^ The war against the Greeks commenced in 
480 B. C. After his defeat, Xerxes returned to Persia 
in 479. It was then when they had gathered the young 



1 Herodotus, vii, 35. 

2 Plutarchus, De cohibenda ira, 5. 

^ Esther i, i ; Herodotus vii, 7, 9, 97, 98; viii, 65, 69. 

* Herodotus vii, 61-95. 

^ Herodotus vii, 8, etc. 



THE BOOK OF ESTHER. 389 

girls to be offered to the king, and it is this expedition 
against the Greeks which explains to us the long inter- 
val between the repudiation of Vasthi and the choice of 
Esther. The chronology of the history of Xerxes is 
therefore in perfect accord with the Scriptural narrative. 

5. LIVING PROOFS OF THE REALITY OF THE HISTORY 
OF ESTHER. 

Besides, there exists an always living proof of the 
reality of the history of Esther; it is the celebration of 
the Jewish feast of the Purim, which is the annual com- 
memoration thereof. The children of Israel have 
never ceased to celebrate it with the greatest rejoicings. 
They have given it the name of " Day of Mardochai " 
as well as that of Purim^ Such an institution can be 
explained only by the reality of the occurrences it com- 
memorates; its name which signifies ^' fates," is fixed 
and interpreted by the sacred account.^ The Rational- 
ists have no serious objection to of¥er against such a 
formal and explicit testimony. *' The author," says 
Noeldeke, '' had for his object a desire to acquaint all 
the Jews with the origin of the feast of Purim, and to 
recommend to them its observation. The establish- 
ment of this feast, unknown to the Pentateuch, does not 
seem to have any connection with the deliverance en 
masse of the Jews from the threatened death. (This 
manner of denying without proof by a " does not seem," 
an event related at great length and with much detail, 
is still more than strange.) This feast must have been 
borrowed from Persian rites. (Again an affirmation. 
a priori without proof.) Even to this day, the Jews 

^ II. Mach. XV, 37. 
2 Esther ix, 24, 26, 31. 



390 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

celebrate certain feasts derived from other religions. 
(Admitted, but show us the authorities that afhx to 
such feasts a distinctive Jewish origin, hke that of the 
Purim.) In every case we can maintain that the occa- 
sion of this joyful feast is not that which one attributes 
to it."^ And why? One does not tell. It is difficult 
to see a more pitiful argument: it is denying in order 
to deny, without even a plausible pretext. This lan- 
guage, stripped of its equivocals, signifies: We have no 
proof, but we deny nevertheless. 

The borrowing of the Purim feast from Persia is, 
however, admitted by the Rationalists, in spite of the 
absence of the least proof. Paul de Lagarde has even 
discovered the Persian feast which the Jews adopted: 
it is that of Fordigan or Pordigan, by which the 
Persians celebrate with great festivities the commem- 
oration of their dead. Such, however, is not the object 
of the feast of Purim, as we have seen. The word 
Purim, in certain Greek manuscripts, is written phour- 
dia, phourmaia or phrouraienay and behold how the 
Jewish feast becomes a feast of Persian origin! A 
lapsus calami of the scribes furnishes the demonstra- 
tion. When recourse to such ill* reasoning becomes 
necessary, it is equivalent to an admission that no good 
reasoning is possible. 

6. ADDITIONS TO THE GREEK AND LATIN BIBLES. 

It only remains for us to say a few words about the 
additions we notice in the Greek and Latin Bibles. 

The Book of Esther, besides its pro-canonical part 
we have in Hebrew, contains a deutero-canonical part, 

1 Th. Noeldeke, " Literarisch Geschichte de A. T.," p. 124. 

2 P. de Lagarde, " Gesammelte Abhandlungen," p. 161-165. 



THE BOOK OF ESTHER. 39 1 

which exists no longer in the versions. It contains a 
certain number of passages which we might call justifi- 
cations, i. e., the edicts of the great king, and diverse 
parts which are so many supplements: the dream of 
Mardochai, his prayer to God, and that of Esther, etc. 
The authenticity of all the additions is naturally 
rejected by all the Rationalists as also by many Protes- 
tants who admit the historical character of the book, 
as it appears in the Hebrew Bible. 

However, they have no particular objection to bring 
forward against these fragments. They were known 
and accepted by the historian Josephus Flavins, who 
made use of them in his "Jewish Antiquities:" con- 
sequently, their antiquity cannot be questioned; the 
Hebraisms we remark therein, as well as the existence 
of two different Greek translations, tend to prove that 
they are translated from a Hebrew original; all that we 
read therein is in harmony with the content of the 
proto-canonical part. Hence, there exists no reason 
to contest the veracity thereof. 



CHAPTER XXXVII. 



THE BOOKS OF THE MACHABEES.— BOOK I. 

ALL the critics, even the RationaUsts, are now 
agreed that the First Book of the Machabees is 
historically correct. However, four objections have 
been made against the same. They have reference to 
the Greco-Macedonian history and to the judgments 
passed on the Romans. 

I. ALEXANDER THE FIRST THAT RULED OVER GREECE. 

The history of the Machabees opens as follows: 
" Now it came to pass that Alexander, the son of Philip, 
the Macedonian, who first reigned in Greece, coming 
out of the land of Cethim (Europe), had overthrown 
Darius, King of the Persians and of the Medes, etc." 
(I. Mach. I, I.) The Greek text adds that Alexander 
was the first who reigned in Greece " instead of Darius." 
Such is the passage which gives rise to the first objec- 
tion. 

The reading of the Vulgate offers no serious diffi- 
culty. The sacred author could say very well that 
Alexander the Great was the first that ruled over 
Greece. Alexander did not possess the title of King 
of Greece, although the monarchical power was invested 
in him. This is admitted even by our adversaries. The 
general assembly of the Greeks at Corinth conferred 
(39^) 



THE BOOKS OF THE MACHABEES. 393 

Upon Alexander the dignity of general-in-chief, as pre- 
viously upon his father, and thus he was in fact King of 
Greece. He, is, moreover, the first v^ho adopted on his 
coins the title of king. Hov^ever, it is not certain at 
all that the original text did qualify here Alexander the 
*' first " King of Greece. According to the Syriac ver- 
sion, and several Greek manuscripts, it is simply said 
'' that he v^as King of Greece before becoming master " 
of Asia, but since, further on,^ the Sacred Text explicitly 
states that Alexander '' v^as the first King of the 
Greeks," it matters Httle that the Syriac version 
and Greek manuscripts do not also make this asser- 
tion. 

As for the statement of the Greek that Alexander, 
instead of Darius, reigned over Greece, it cannot be 
justified in the sense in v^hich it is generally understood. 
It has been stated that Darius Codomanus attributed 
to himself the royalty over the Greeks, and by destroy- 
ing his power the son of Philip had thus replaced him; 
but, besides that this explanation is hardly a natural 
one, it does not make Alexander the first of the Grecian 
monarchs. Then, again, we do not need to defend 
an expression which we read neither in the Vulgate 
nor in the Syriac version. The Greek text which we 
possess is only a translation of the original Hebrew 
which has been lost. Now, the version of the first 
verse leaves much to be desired. The phrasing is 
poorly constructed, and we must not understand it in 
the sense that Darius reigned over Greece, nor that 
Alexander became King of Greece instead of Darius, 
which would be not only contrary to history, but also 
to the language of the historian, as we said above. We 

^ I. Mach. vi, 2. 



394 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

must translate, as the Syriac version has done: ''Alex- 
ander reigned over Greece, and he became King (of 
Asia) instead of Darius." 

* 

2. THE DIVISION OF ALEXANDER'S KINGDOM AMONG 
HIS GENERALS. 

The second objection is directed against what the 
sacred author states ^ of Alexander the Great: That 
before dying he divided his kingdom among his 
generals. Here the Biblical writer is accused of great 
ignorance. 

In fact, however, the Jewish historian has not dis- 
played any greater ignorance than the historians of 
Alexander themselves. These relate that the most 
conflicting rumors were circulated with regard to his 
last moments, and as to the nature of the will he had 
made; his biographers contradict one another. Ac- 
cording to Arrien, " when they asked the conqueror 
to whom he would leave his kingdom, he answered: 
to the most worthy," but Arrien is careful to remark 
that this is simply the version of the historians, and he 
adds, " that they have written many other things about 
the death of Alexander." ^ Quintus Curcius states ex- 
pressly that " several have written that Alexander had 
divided by will his provinces among his generals."^ It 
is this what the author of the Second Book of the 
Machabees relates, except the important circumstances 
of the will of which he does not speak. Several Oriental 
writers are also in accord with him, such as Moses of 
Khoren and diverse Persian and Arabian Chroniclers. 



^ I Mach, i, 6-7. 

^ Arrien, *' Exped. Alexand.," vii, 16, 27. 

^ Qi Curcius, " Histor. Alex.," x, 10. 



THE BOOKS OF THE MACHABEES. 395 

According to all testimony, it is impossible to-day to 
tax as false the account of the sacred author, and, even 
taking a purely profane standpoint, by what right can 
one reject his testimony, when nothing is certain, be- 
cause he is the most ancient writer that has made 
known to us the last moments of Alexander the Great? 
He wrote one century before our era, and Diodor of 
Sicily wrote only under the reign of Augustus, Quintus 
Curcius under that of Tiberius and Arrien under that of 
Hadrian. 

3. JUDGMENT ON THE ROMANS. 

The third objection against the First Book of the 
Machabees has reference to the following passage: 
" Now Judas heard of the fame of the Romans that they 
were powerful and strong, and willingly agreed to all 
things that are requested of them; and that whosoever 
has come to them they have made amity with them, 
and that they are mighty in power. And they heard 
of their battles and their noble acts, which they had 
done in Galatia, how they had conquered them and 
brought them under tribute; and how great things 
they had done in the land of Spain, and that they had 
brought under their power the mines of silver and of 
gold that are there, and had gotten possession of all 
the place by their counsel and patience. And had con- 
quered places that were very far off from them, and 
kings that came against them from the ends of the 
earth, and had overthrown them with great slaughter; 
and the rest pay them tribute every year. And that 
they had defeated in battles Philip, and Persis the 
King of the Ceteans, and the rest that had borne arms 
against them, and had conquered them. And how 



396 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Antiochus the Great, King of Asia, who went to fight 
against them, having a hundred and twenty elephants, 
with horsemen and chariots and a very great army, was 
routed by them. And how they took him aUve^ and 
appointed to him that both he and they that should 
reign after him should pay a great tribute, and that he 
should give hostages, and that which was agreed upon. 
And the country of the Indians, and of the Medes, and 
of the Lydians, some of their best provinces; and those 
which they had taken from them, they gave to King 
Eumenes. And that they who were in Greece had a 
mind to go and destroy them, and they had knowledge 
thereof. And they sent a general against them and 
fought with them, and many of them were slain, and 
they carried away their wives and their children captives, 
and spoiled them, and took possession of their land 
and threw down their walls, and brought them to be 
their servants unto this day. x\nd the other kingdoms, 
and islands, that at any time had resisted them, they 
had destroyed and brought under their power. But 
with their friends, and such as relied upon them, they 
kept amity, and had conquered kingdoms that were 
near and that were far ofif ; for all that heard their name 
were afraid of them. That whom they had a mind to 
help to a kingdom, those reigned; and whom they 
would, they deposed from the kingdom; and they were 
greatly exalted. And none of all these wore a crown, 
or was clothed in purple, to be magnified thereby. And 
that they had made themselves a senate-house, and con- 
sulted daily three hundred and twenty men, that sat 
in counsel always for the people, that they might do 
the things that were right. And that they committed 
their government to one man every year, to rule over 



THE BOOKS OF THE MACHABEES. 397 

all their country, and they all obey one, and there is no 
envy nor jealousy among them."^ 

The above passage is given by the Rationalists as an 
example of the errors into which the sacred writer has 
fallen. 

Certainly, we are far from pretending that the 
judgment passed on the Romans, and that all the facts 
enumerated in chapter eight of the First Book of Macha- 
bees, are entirely correct. The repubHc had two an- 
nual consuls and not only one; its disinterestedness 
was not such as Judas the Machabee beheved; jealousy 
and envy were not evils unknown to the Romans; the 
number of senators was not three hundred and twenty, 
but only three hundred; they did not assemble every 
day, Qven this w^as forbidden to them, etc. 

But whatever one may point out in the detail, one 
cannot accuse the sacred historian of any historical 
error. He states expressly that Judas '' heard the ac- 
count " of all these things ;2 he speaks in the name of 
rumor, and he relates current rumors, as then existing 
in Judea, in regard to the Romans; his exactitude in 
the present case must consist and really does consist, 
not in writing a chapter of the real history of Rome, but 
in being the faithful interpreter of the rumors which, 
being circulated in Judea, had come to the ears of 
Judas Machabeus, and they moved the Jewish hero, 
the more so because of the falsity they contained, to 
seek the Roman alliance. It is a principle admitted by 
all the theologians and by all the authors who have 
occupied themselves with sacred hermeneutic: the in- 
spiration does not imply that all that we read in Scrip- 

^ I Mach. viii, 1-16. 
^ I Mach. viii, 1-2. 



398 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

ture is true in itself. The discourses of the friends of 
Job are partly tainted with error. That what the 
Amalikite writes to David about the circumstances of 
the death of Saul is false and a lie;^ nevertheless the 
sacred writer tells the truth in relating this falsehood, 
because this falsehood had been effectively committed 
by the Amalekite. So also the author of the First 
Book of the Machabees tells the truth in relating the 
inexact ideas they had of the politics and history of the 
Romans in Judea, because they were really the current 
ideas in this country. Hence, one may point out in 
the passage quoted as many errors as he pleases, but 
nothing of all this can furnish material for a solid objec- 
tion against the inspiration of the sacred writer. 

Besides, it is good to remark that they have, often 
exaggerated these inexactitudes. Thus what is re- 
ported of Eumenus II., King of Pergamum, may be true. 
It is certain that the Romans, in order to reward him 
for his attachment and services he had rendered to them 
in the battle of Magnesia, gave him Lydia, as the 
Sacred Text says. When they did not give to him India 
and Media, to round off his kingdom, which was in the 
west of the Taurus, they gave to him Ionia and Mysia,^ 
etc., and it is probable that we must read in our text 
the " lonians and the Medes." 

4. TIES OF RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE JEWS AND 
SPARTIATES. 

The last exactitude with which the First Book of 
Machabees is charged is that it supposes ties of relation- 
ship between the Jews and the Spartiates. The sacred 

^ II Kings i, 2-10. 

"^ Titus Livius, xxxvii, 55 and xxxviii, 39. 



THE BOOKS OF THE MACHABEES. 399 

author reproduces a letter of Jonathas, the high priest, 
to the Spartiates, and a letter of Arius L, King of 
Sparta, to the high priest Onias. In both it is said that 
these two peoples have a common origin.^ A good 
deal of discussion has been entered into in order to 
determine whether this opinion was maintainable. The 
majority believes it hardly probable, but, be this as it 
may, we do not need to occupy ourselves here with this 
question. Whether the Spartiates have been or not 
children of Abraham matters little, according to several 
Catholic commentators. The sacred writer limits him- 
self to report two documents, the exactitude of which 
he has not to certify to, but the existence of which he 
has only to affirm. The insertion of these letters into 
the structure of his account proves that these letters 
are authentic, but not that what they contain is vera- 
cious. Hence, in this regard the reader may believe or 
not believe' as he pleases. 

Only we have to remark that, according to these 
letters, one cannot deny that Sparta and Judea were 
united by an alliance, for when the correspondents could 
be deceived on the obscure question of a remote origin, 
it is not the same in regard to a recent fact. Also, the 
Rationalists themselves generally admit the reality of 
the alliance, although it is unknown to us by any other 
documents. Palmer, who has carefully studied this 
passage of the First Book of Machabees, has supposed 
that this alHance ascended to the year three hundred 
and two before our era. In this epoch, Poliorcetus, 
having conquered the Peloponesus, his father, Antig- 
onus, recalled him to Asia Minor in order to cooperate 
with him to combat Cassander, Lysimachus, Ptolemy 

^ I Mach. xii, 5-23. 



400 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

and Seleucus, all confederates against him. The Spar- 
tiates neglected nothing to increase the number of the 
enemies of Antigonus and Demetrius: they sought to 
stir up against him different nations of Asia, and par- 
ticularly the Jews. Arius I. was at that time King of 
Sparta and Onias I., son of Juddas, high priest, as our 
text indicates. The first reigned from 309 to 300 B. C. 
The synchronism is, therefore, perfectly exact. Later 
on, about the year 144 B. C, Jonathas being in need of 
allies naturally sought to renew the alliance which he 
had concluded at that time with the Spartiates. 

They have pretended, it is true, that the independ- 
ence of Greece having been annihilated by the Romans 
since the year 146 B. C, it was not very probable that 
the brother of Judas, the Machabee, had counted on 
the help of Sparta, but we know through Strabo^ that 
this city, which was for the Romans civitas foederata, 
preserved both its power and liberty, even after this 
catastrophe, and that it was only obliged to render 
some services towards Rome; therefore, it could still 
be useful to the Romans. Consequently, one can 
allege nothing serious against the fact of correspond- 
ence. Also Wernsdorf, one of the most vehement 
enemies of the Books of Machabees, cannot help saying: 
" In the letter of Jonathan, I find nothing that could 
not have been written by a Jewish high priest. . . . 
Certainly it appears to have been written by a pious, 
grave and prudent man, a man well versed in the civil 
affairs. I remark therein well-connected words and 
very correct thoughts. ... I find nothing therein 
that is blameworthy, except that he speaks too often 
of the ancient alliance between Arius and Onias, and of 

^ Strabo viii, v. c. 



THE BOOKS OF THE MACHABEES. 4OI 

the supposed relationship between the two nations. 
But he was a man and may have been deceived."^ 
Therefore, one cannot bring forward any serious argu- 
ment against the authenticity of this letter, no more 
than against the other official documents contained in 
this history. 

THE DESCRIPTION OF THE ARMY OF ANTIOCHUS 
IV. EUPATOR. 

We will say a few words, in ending the examination 
of the First Book of Machabees, of a passage which can- 
not ofifer any real difficulty, but which merits, however, 
to be discussed. In describing the army of Antiochus 
IV. Eupator, the sacred author says that they counted 
therein thirty-two elephants, on whom they placed 
wooden towers, and that on each elephant there were 
fifty-two men.^ The presence of the elephants in the 
armies of the Seleucides offers no difficulty. This 
is attested by both the profane historians and by 
the medals of the Syrian kings. What is embarrassing 
is the number of men placed on each of these 
animals. In India, in all times, elephants have been 
made use of in warfare, and even in the present 
time these massive quadrupeds are burdened with 
towers in this country; but it is impossible to place 
thirty-two men therein. According to Titus Livius, 
the towers of the elephants of the army of Antiochus 
the Great, contained four men, aside from the elephant 
driver; Pliny relates that, in the games given by JuHus 
Caesar, the elephants who took part in a fictitious com- 



^ G. Wernsdorf, << Commentatio Historico-Critica de Fide His- 
torica Librorum Machabaicorum," p. 148 and 169-170. 
2 I. Mach. vi, 30-37 
D. B.— 26 



402 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

bat carried three men; Elien indicates the same number 
for India; Munro says that in this country these ani- 
mals carry to-day four or five persons. Besides, it is 
sufBcient to look at an elephant and recognize that he 
cannot carry thirty warriors. How could one place 
on the back of a single one of these animals a tower 
large enough to contain so many armed men, who 
need to be free in their movements in order to face 
the enemy? Moreover, the average weight which an 
elephant is capable of carrying is about three thousand 
pounds, and we have to reduce this to about the half 
for long marches and combats. Now, they have 
figured that thirty-two soldiers would weigh at least 
six thousand four hundred pounds. Also, the most 
judicious interpreters are unanimously agreed to ac- 
knowledge that the reading of thirty-two is false, on 
account of an error of either the Greek translator or 
by a mistake of the copyists. The correction which 
is most favorably accepted by the critics is that pro- 
posed by Michaelis. He believes that the sacred author 
had written " two or three;" three, put into the plural 
in Hebrew, means thirty. When the elephants had 
disappeared, because the Romans had forbidden to the 
Seleucid kings to employ these animals in warfare, the 
copyists, not knowing them any longer, were inclined, 
according to the custom of the Orientals, to exaggerate 
the figures so that they read two and thirty, or thirty- 
two instead of two or three. 



BOOK II. 



As much as the Rationalists render homage to the 
historical value of the First Book of Machabees, so 



THE BOOKS OF THE MACHABEES. 403 

much, according to them, the second of these books is 
unworthy of beHef. In regard to a great part of its con- 
tents, they say it is replete with fiction, and in contra- 
diction with itself and the writer of the first book. 
Behold how Noeldeke expresses himself as to this sub- 
ject: 

" The value of the Second Book of Machabees is 
much inferior to that of the First. Certainly it gives 
some more complete accounts, especially for the history 
anterior to the moment when the insurrection broke 
out. Josephus, who did not know this book, confirms 
its exactitude. Nevertheless we meet therein many 
errors from the standpoint of chronology and of the 
events. It is over only an exaggeration, rhetorical, 
and partisan spirit. The miracles, the apparition of 
angels, return on each page, and for the first time appear 
those histories of martyrs related in a measureless man- 
ner. The book is full of an exuberant patriotism, and 
of a bitter hatred against the stranger. The author 
was quite a slave of popular prejudices, and he wrote 
to strengthen them. In his opinions he approached 
the Pharisees a good deal. Thus, he strongly believes 
in the resurrection. In summar}^, his work forms about 
many points, a striking contrast with the First Book 
of Machabees."^ 

The critic, in reproaching the author of his miracu- 
lous accounts, reveals to us the reason for which the 
RationaUsts are so badly disposed in his regard. But 
the miracles, as we had occasion to state repeatedly, 
are no sufficient motive to question the veracity of a 
writer. Heliodorus, in whose subject is related one of 



^ Th. Noeldeke, ** Literarische Geschichte des Alten Testa- 
mentes." 



404 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

the principal miracles, which had for end to hinder the 
sacking of the temple of Jerusalem (IL Mach. iii), is 
quite an historical personage. He was minister of 
Seleucus IV. Philopator, King of Syria (187-175 B. C). 
Appien teaches us that he caused the perishment of 
his master in order to take hold of his throne.^ They 
have recovered, in 1877 and 1879, on the island of 
Delos, two Greek inscriptions which have reference to 
him. They make known to us that his father called 
himself Eschylus and that he was Antiochus. One of 
these inscriptions gives to him the same title as the 
Book of Machabees and in the same terms. 

I. LETTERS OF THE JEV^S OF JERUSALEM TO THOSE 
OF EGYPT. 

The objections which they have raised against the 
letters at the head of this book, and in which we read 
also miraculous facts, are not better founded. The 
infidels, like Noeldeke, reject them absolutely. He 
says: ''The Second Book of the Machabees must be 
before all freed from the two letters which they have 
placed at the head of this work. It is pretended that 
they were written by the Jews of Palestine to recom- 
mend to their brethren of Egypt to take part in the 
feast of the consecration of the Temple. The first even 
carries, as inscription, a date which answers to the 
year 143 B.C.^ Both letters are evidently unauthentic; 
the first, quite incomplete, contains a false chrono- 
logical account; the second is full of fables and would 
be the most absurd, were it really the letter of a com- 



^ Appien, " De Rebus Syriacis," 45. 
2 II Mach. i, 10. 



THE BOOKS OF THE MACHABEES. 405 

munity. These letters contain more than one contra- 
diction with the very facts related in the Book of 
Machabees."^ 

Such are the objections. Behold the answer: 
" The first letter, they say, contains a false chrono- 
logical account." There is nothing of the kind. In 
verse 7, of chapter i, there is mention of the year 169 
and, in verse 10, of the year 144 and of the year 124 
before our era. They pretend to hold in this two con- 
tradictory dates of the letter, but without reason. The 
letter was written in 124, and what is said of 144 is re- 
ported as a past fact. 

They claim, it is true that if the letter was written 
in 124, the Jews of Judea would have invited those of 
Egypt, as they do by this letter, to celebrate the feast 
of the purification of the Temple ; estabUshed by Judas 
the Machabee, only forty years after its institution. 

What is inadmissible in this? The Jews of Palestine 
might have had reasons, of which we have no knowl- 
edge, to have written at that time only to their core- 
ligionists of Egypt; besides, nothing proves that this 
invitation was the first; it is possible that it was only 
the renewal of an invitation which had been previously 
extended. 

The second letter placed at the head of the Second 
Book of Machabees is still more lively incriminated than 
the first. The facts which they refuse to regard as his- 
torical are in the number of three: The miracle of the 
sacred fire drawn from a dried up well, by order of 
Nehemias, and kindling itself.- The history of Jeremias 
hiding the Tabernacle and the Ark of the Covenant 



^ Noeldeke,Opus cit. p. 99. 
^ n Mach. i, 19-36. 



406 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBl E. 

upon Mount Nebo/ and finally the death of Antiochus 
which is related differently than in the history of Jason, 
source of the chapters following.^ 

2. THE SACRED FIRE. 

Those who deny the supernatural and the miracle 
have to reject the account of the sacred fire miracu- 
lously kindUng itself, but they refuse to admit it on 
philosophical and not historical grounds, just as they 
refuse to accept, in virtue of the same principles, the 
miracle of the fire from heaven burning the holocausts 
of Aaron, -^ of Solomon,* and of the prophet Elias.^ 
All these facts are nevertheless historical. What the 
letter of the Jews relates could be well known to them 
by oral tradition; moreover, it was drawn from written 
sources lost to-day, to which they were careful to refer.^ 

3. THE ARK HIDDEN. 

With regard to the history of the Ark and the 
Tabernacle hidden by Jeremias on Mount Nebo, one 
could hardly understand why the Rationalistic critics 
refuse to admit it, would it be unknown to us that they 
pretend that the Ark and the Tabernacle never 
existed. Since the account of the Book of Machabees 
contradicts their affirmations, they deny it, and since 
they cannot deny it without some pretext, they say that 
Jeremias was in prison at the moment when the city 



1 II Mach. ii, 4-8. 

^ II Mach. i, 13-16 and ix. 

^ II Mach. ix, 24. 

* II Par. vii, i. 

^ III Kin^s xviii, 38. 

* II Mach. ii, i, 4, 13. 



THE BOOKS OF THE MACHABEES. 407 

was taken, and that it was impossible for one man to 
carry the Ark and the Tabernacle from Jerusalem 
beyond the Jordan to Mount Nebo. 

Undoubtedly, Jeremias was in prison, but he was 
delivered by the Chaldean conquerors, and between the 
time he was set at liberty and the destruction of the 
Temple, one whole month had passed.^ Hence, he had 
ample time to transport these sacred objects. As for 
the necessary help, what should have prevented the 
prophet from appealing to his friends for assistance? 
Nabuchodonosor had given orders to permit to Jere- 
mias full Hberty.^ 

4. THE DEATH OF ANTIOCHUS. 

The third fact, that of the death of Antiochus, offers 
a real difftculty. The letter seems to relate the same 
event which we read a few chapters further on, and 
which is also reported in the First Book,^ but the cir- 
cumstances, either to the place where Antiochus learned 
the news of the defeat of his army, or to the nature of 
his illness, are so different that a reconciliation appears 
impossible. '' One has remarked," says Cellerier, " that 
in both books of the Machabees, Antiochus dies in three 
different ways."* 

We admit that Antiochus whose death is related 
in the First Book of Machabees and in the body of the 
account of the Second is the same, that is, Antiochus 
IV. Epiphanes. Further on we will inquire whether 
the one of whom the letter of the Jerusalem Jews speaks 
is not different. 

^ Jer. xxxviii, 28; xxxix, 2, 11-14; Hi, 12-13. 

^ Jer. xxxix^ 12. 

^ II Mach. i, 13-16 and ix; I Mach. vi. 

* Cellerier, "Introduction a la Lecture des Livres Saints." 



408 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 



5. THE NAME OF THE TEMPLE PILLAGED BY 
ANTIOCHUS. 

It is claimed, in the first place, that a contradiction 
exists in the meaning of the place where was located 
the Temple which Antiochus IV. Epiphanes wished to 
pillage. In the First Book of Machabees, according 
to the received reading and the translation of the Vul- 
gate, it is Elymais, city of Persia;^ in the Second it is 
Persepolis.^ 

It is easy to clear up both passages. The reading 
/' Elymais," city of Persia, is false; the better Greek 
manuscripts read: "There is in Elymaid, in Persia, a 
famous city." This reading is the only true one, for 
there never existed a city called Elymais. Therefore, 
the sacred author does not name the city the Temple of 
which Antiochus tried to pillage; he only says that it 
was situated in the province of Elymaid, "which formed 
a part of the kingdom of Persia. Polybius and Appien 
do the same.^ The Second Book of Machabees desig- 
nates the city by the name of Persepolis. As this city 
was situated in Persia, properly speaking, not in Media, 
it can be supposed that " Persepolis " signifies in this 
passage, not the city called by this name, but in trans- 
lating the word, " the city or capital of the Persians," 
that is probably Susa, in Elymaid, one of the principal 
royal residences of the King of Persia, and one of the 
best known by the Jews on account of the history of 
Esther and of Assuerus. 



^ I Mach. vi, i. 
2 II Mach. ix, 3. 



Polybius, xxxi, 11 ; Appien, "De Rebus Syriacis," 66, p. 208. 



THE BOOKS OF THE MACHABEES. 409 

After his attempt to pillage the Temple, Antiochus 
Epiphanes learns of the disaster which the Jews caused 
to his army; he learns this ''in Persia," says the First 
Book of A'lachabees; "near Ecbatana," consequently 
in Media, says the Second. 

There exists no contradiction between the two 
accounts; only the Second, as in the preceding case, 
is more precise and indicates in a more express manner 
where the Syrian king found himself, whilst the first 
indicates this only in a vague and general manner, 
understanding by Persia the whole of Ariana, which 
comprised Media, because this province formed a part 
of the kingdom of Persia. Antiochus, according to 
Polybius and St. Jerome,^ died at Tabes, city of Persia, 
province of Parsetacena, between Ecbatana and Perse- 
polis.^ The circumstances of his death are related 
more at length in the Second Book of Machabees than 
in the First, but both passages are in perfect accord; 
the second narrator completes only what the first had 
abridged."'^ 

6. THE LETTER OF THE JERUSALEM JEWS. 

The reconciliation of these two accounts offers, 
therefore, no serious difificulty. Is it the same for the 
narrative of the death of Antiochus contained in the 
letter of the Jews? According to this letter, Antio- 
chus, wishing to pillage the Temple of Nanea, is intro- 
duced therein by the priests of the goddess with a small 
number of companions and is killed therein:* according 

^ Polybius, xxxi, 11, p. 72; St. Jerome. " Comm. in Dan." xi, 

44-45- 

"^ Quintus Curcius, v, 13. 

3 I Mach. vi, 8-16; II Mach. ix, 5-28. 

* II Mach. i, 14-16. 



4IO DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

to the narrative of the First and Second Books of 
Machabees inserted in the body of the work, Antio- 
chus is repulsed from the Temple which he intended to 
pillage and dies in the road, at his retm'n into Syria. ^ 

These details appear absolutely irreconcilable, when 
we admit, as the Rationalistic interpreters, and even 
many Cathohcs do, that the Antiochus designated in 
all these places is the same. But the letter of the Jews 
does not say at all that the king of whom it speaks 
is Antiochus IV. Epiphanes, and because the one whose 
death it relates has perished in another manner than 
Antiochus IV., the natural conclusion is that another 
Antiochus was meant. Indeed, it is hard to admit that 
a writer, even not inspired, could contradict himself 
so formally in so few pages apart. Even if we had no 
means of explaining these two passages by extrinsic 
testimonies, on account of the scarcity of accounts 
arrived to us about these so remote epochs, we would 
have the right to afifirm as follows: The king whom the 
writer, at the beginning of his work, makes to die a 
violent death, in a temple which he intends to pillage, 
is not the same king whose death he describes further 
on. The latter, he tells us, was obliged to flee at the 
moment when he also wished to pillage a temple;^ the 
author gives us the most circumstantial details of his 
flight and of the last days of his life, on the nature of his 



^ I Mach vi, 1-16; II Mach. ix, 2-28. 

2 That two kings of the same name made the attempt to pillage 
a temple, must not surprise us, because this was nothing rare 
in antiquity. Strabo reports, for instance, that a Parthian king, 
Mithridates I., pillaged, and with more success than the Antiochus, 
in the same province of Elymaid, two temples, the one at Athens, 
the other at Artemis. Strabo xvi, i, iv, p. 634. See what Diodor 
of Sicily says, xxviii, 3 vol. ii, p. 473, of a Macedonian king. 



THE BOOKS OF THE MACHABEES. 4I I 

bowel troubles which caused him great pain, on the 
accident on the road which aggravated his state, on the 
worms which gnawed at his body and which caused it 
to fall into putrefaction. Both pictures are different; 
therefore, they do not represent the death of the same 
personage. 

We would be justified to draw this conclusion even 
then, if we could not bring forward any other proofs. 
But to corroborate it, to render it unassailable, we 
have other arguments. We know through the profane 
authors that two kings of Syria, both carrying the 
name of Antiochus, perished, the one in the manner 
as related in chapter six of the First Book of Machabees 
and in chapter nine of the Second, — this is Antiochus 
Epiphanes - — the other in the manner as related by the 
letter of the Jews of Jerusalem — this is Antiochus III. 
the Great. A fragment of Polybius happily escaped 
the wreck of a part of his works, contains as follows: 
" In Syria, the King Antiochus, wishing to procure 
money, resolved to undertake an expedition against the 
temple of Diana in the Elymaid. When he had arrived 
there, he was frustrated in his hopes, because the bar- 
barians who lived in these places hindered him from 
executing such a great crime. During his return, he 
died at Tabes, city of Persia, attacked with madness, 
as some say, on account of the prodigies produced by 
the deity of the temple whom he had ofifended."^ The 
accord, for the ensemble, between Polybius and that of 
the two Books of Machabees as to the death of Antio- 
chus Epiphanes, leaves nothing to desire. 

Behold now how various ancient writers relate the 
death of Antiochus III. the Great " Antiochus the 



* Polybius, xxxi. 11. 



412 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Great/' says Strabo, " desiring to pillage the Temple of 
Belus, the barbarians of the neighborhood attacked 
him without any other help and killed him."^ "The 
King Antiochus/' says Justin, '' with his army attacked 
at night the temple of the Elymean Jupiter. The 
matter becoming known, he with his army was killed 
by the concourse of the inhabitants."^ According to 
these accounts, Antiochus III. perished, therefore, as 
related by the letter of the Jews, that is, murdered whilst 
pillaging the temple of Belus.^ Since the circum- 
stances of the death related by both the letter and the 
profane authors are the same, and different from those 
of the death of Antiochus IV., how could we doubt that 
there is question here of Antiochus III.? 

Against this explanation it is objected that the 
king in question had persecuted the Jews, and that 
Antiochus III. was no persecutor. But the text does 
not speak of a persecution properly speaking; it speaks 
only of combats,* and contains nothing against the king 
himself.'^ The letter even makes no allusion to the 
profanation of the temple, although it had for end to 
ask the Jews of Egypt to participate in the feast of the 



1 Strabo, xvi, i, i8. 

"^ Justin xxxii, ii, i. 

3 It Is called temple of Belus or Elymean Jupiter, whilst the 
letter desip:nates the temple of Nanea. Nanea was the espoused 
goddess of Bel. Therefore, they must have also honored her in the 
temple of Bel. 

* II Mach. i, 12. 

5 At the end of the paragraph of the letter, II. Mach. i, 17, we 
read only the qualificative "impious" in the plural form, applied to 
both king Antiochus and his soldiers, but when they are designated 
thus, it is because they wished to pillage a temple, commit a sacri- 
legous work, not on account of their conduct towards the Jews. 



THE BOOKS OF THE MACHABEES. 413 

temple. There is every reason to believe that the 
Jews of Jerusalem would have adopted quite a different 
tone, if there had been question of persecutions by 
Antiochus Epiphanes. When the First and Second 
Book of Machabees relate the death of the latter, their 
language is quite different. 

Besides, the whole part of the letter with regard to 
the death of the King of Syria applies itself easily, 
when one admits that it has reference to Antiochus III., 
as is indicated by the details given by the Jews and by 
the profane writers. The news of his death must have 
been agreeable to the Egyptians, and also undoubtedly 
to a Jew who, like Aristobolus, lived at the court of 
the King of Egypt, because Antiochus III. had been 
almost his lifetime in war with the Egyptians. It is for 
this motive that the inhabitants of Jerusalem com- 
mence their letter with the narrative: " Having been 
delivered by God out of great dangers, we give Him 
great thanks, forasmuch as we have been in war with 
siich a king."^ 

This king is the King of Egypt, of whom there is 
question in the preceding verse, and who was master 
of Palestine at the death of Antiochus III. The Jews 
had already fought against the King of Egypt. They 
subjected themselves willingly to Antiochus III., 
King of Syria, in joining his troops who besieged 
Scopas, general of Ptolemy, in the fortress of Jerusa- 
lem ;2 now they were expected to combat Egypt anew. 
Some time after the capture of the citadel of Jerusalem, 
the King of Syria had ceded Palestine, which had fallen 
again under his dominion, to the King of Egypt, in 

^ II Mach. i, II. 

2 Josephus, ''Jewish Antiquities" xii, iii, 3 



414 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

giving it as a gift to his daughter Cleopatra.^ He acted 
deceitfully, and he calculated on this marriage to realize 
his ambitious projects against the Ptolemys; he was 
deceived, his daughter took the interests of her husband 
against her own father,^ and the Romans hindered him 
to take revenge on Egypt. Then he directed himself 
towards Asia Minor, where he had various success, 
passed into Greece, and by the advice of Hannibal, the 
famous Carthagenian general who had taken refuge 
to him, he entered into war with the Romans — an 
unfortunate undertaking. Stopped in his victorious 
course at the Thermophyles, in 191 B. C, he was, after 
different defeats, completely beaten at Magnesia of 
Lydia, in 190. The peace concluded in 188 was a hard 
one for him. The conquerors obliged him to give up 
all his possessions in the west of Mount Taurus, and to 
pay to them, in successive installments, the enormous 
sum of fifteen millions of Eubean talents.^ 

In order to fulfill this onerous condition, Antiochus 
desired to pillage the temple of Nanea where he 
perished. Had he succeeded in his undertaking, there 
is reason to believe that he would have made the 
attempt to take revenge on the Egyptians for the dis- 
grace the Romans had heaped on him. After having 
been an enemy of Egypt all his lifetime, he certainly 
must have entertained evil designs against this country. 
Although the Jews could not personally complain 
against him during the latter years, they certainly 



' Josephus, Op. cit. xii, iv, i ; Cf. Polybius xxviii, 17, part ii, 
P- 37- 

2 Dan. xi, 17 and St. Jerome, in loc, voL xxv, col. 564. 

3 Appien, " De Rebus Syriacis," 38. The Eubean talent 
amounts to about $1,100. 



THE BOOKS OF THE MACHABEES. 415 

would have had to suffer by a war between the Seleu- 
cides and the Ptolemys. Whoever might have been 
the conqueror or conquered, they always would have 
been the victims. '' Under the reign of Antiochus the 
Great, King of Asia," says Josephus, speaking of former 
wars, " it happened that the Jews, whose country was 
ravaged, . . . had a good deal to suffer. Whilst 
this prince waged war against Ptolemy Philopator and 
against his son, surnamed Epiphanes, the Jews would 
have had to suffer, if Antiochus would have been the 
conqueror, and they would have had to suffer equally 
if he had been conquered, so that they appeared like 
a vessel which, in the midst of a storm, is tossed by the 
waves towards all sides, because they found themselves 
in the midst of the combatants, in the good as well as 
in the evil fortune of Antiochus."^ 

When Antiochus perished by assassination, Judea, 
we must not forget, belonged to the kings of Egypt, 
but, through Josephus, we know that Antiochus III. 
left nothing undone to gain the favor of the Jews, and 
all their sympathies were for this prince.^ He had, 
therefore, a powerful party in the holy city and, as can 
be seen in the letter of the Jews, this party had risen 
its head, and the war was to break out at the moment 
when the news of the death of the King of Syria frus- 
trated all the projects of his adherents. 

Therefore everything concurs to establish that 
the Antiochus whose death the Jews relate is Antiochus 
III. the Great. They object, however, again, against 
this explanation, maintaining that this death was too 
old when the letter was written, in that it could be 

^ Josyphus, Ant. jud. xii, iii, 3. 
^ Josyphus, Ant. jud. xii, iii, 3. 



41 6 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

announced as news to the Egyptians. But this objec- 
tion supposes that we know the date of the letter. 
Now, the letter is not dated; therefore we can fix its 
date only according to its contents. Those who 
believe that Anti'ochus whose death is related is 
Epiphanes, say that it was written about 162, because 
Antiochus Epiphanes died in 163, and because Judas 
Machabeus, whom they suppose one of the authors of 
the letter, died in 161. According to this it would have 
been written twenty-five years after the death of Antio- 
chus the Great (187). Certainly one does not announce 
an event of this kind twenty-five years after its fulfill- 
ment. But we cannot fix the date of the letter accord- 
ing to the date of the death of Antiochus, of whom it 
does not speak, as we have seen. The only thing which 
can serve to approximately determine the epoch when 
this writing was sent to Egypt, is the signature which 
teaches us that it was addressed to Aristobolus, '' the 
teacher of King Ptolemy." It is generally admitted 
that this Aristobolus is the peripatetic philosopher of 
this name^ who dedicated to Ptolemy Philometor his 
allegorical explanation of the Pentateuch.^ This King 
Ptolemy is not distinguished by any first name. The 
Ptolemy who governed Egypt when Antiochus III. 
died was Ptolemy V. Epiphanes (204-181). Aris- 
tobolus, who dedicated his work on the Books of Moses 
to the son of Ptolemy V., that is, Ptolemy VI. Philo- 
metor (181-146), might very well have been the " coun- 
selor " of the father, as he was perhaps of the son. 
Hence, the letter must be dated from the year 187 or 

^ Euseb. Praep, Ev. viii, 9 vol. xxi, col. 636. 

^ They also explain the word "teacher" didashalos^ of King 
Ptolemy as meaning counselor. 



THE BOOKS OF THE MACHABEES. 417 

186 B. C, shortly after the death of Airtiochus III. 
the Great, and not from the year 162. 

An apparently decisive objection is made against 
this date. The most of the critics maintain that the 
letter of the Jerusalem Jews had for end to invite those 
of Egypt to come and join them in the celebration of 
the feast of the purification of the temple, which had 
been profaned by Antiochus Epiphanes. This feast 
having been instituted only in 164 B. C, the letter can- 
not be anterior to this epoch. 

Were the general opinion founded, were there really 
question here of the feast known under the name of 
Feast of Dedication,^ the argument would be irrefut- 
able; but whoever will read carefully, and with an 
unbiased mind, the letter of the Jews, will find that not 
one single word is said of the profanation of the temple 
by Antiochus Epiphanes and of the expiatory feasts 
which Judas Machabeus celebrated after having purified 
it. The feast to which the Jews of Egypt are invited 
to join, is, as is expressly stated by the letter, the feast 
of the discovery of the sacred fire by Nehemias: '' There- 
fore, whereas we propose to keep the purification of 
the temple on the five and twentieth of the month of 
Casleu, we thought it necessary to signify it to you, 
that you also may keep the day of Scenopegia (Taber- 
nacles) and the day of the fire that was given when 
Nehemias offered sacrifice, after the temple and the 
altar was built." ^ Can one desire anything more 
categorical and more conclusive? After the foregoing 
words, the letter relates at length the history of the 
discovery of the sacred fire by Nehemias and all that has 

* I Mach. iv, 52-59; H Mach. x, 1-8; John x, 22. 
2 II Mach. i, 18. 
D. B.— ?7 



41 8 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

reference to it, and it concludes saying: "As we are 
then about to celebrate the purification, we have written 
unto you and you shall do well to keep the same days 
(of the festival.)"^ Consequently it follows from this 
that the feast they were about to celebrate in Jerusalem 
on the 25th of Casleu is not that which Judas the 
Machabee instituted in expiation of the profanation 
of the temple of which there is no question, but that 
of the discovery of the sacred fire. The text teaches 
us why it is called " purification," katharismos: it is 
because Jeremias had made use of water from the well 
where the sacred fire had been hidden '' to purify what 
served for sacrifices,"^ and because it had given to the 
place itself where the miracle of the sacred fire was 
effected the name of '' Nephtar, which is interpreted: 
purification {katharismos)!' ^ 

Finally, a last objection they make against the ex- 
planation we have made, is that Judas the Machabee 
is one of the authors of the letter. Now, Judas the 
Machabee was at the head of the Jews only since the 
year 166 until the year 161. Consequently, the letter 
could have been written only between the year 166 
and the year 161, and not about the year 186, as we said 
before. 

This reasoning would be unanswerable were it 
proved that the name of Judas the Machabee is con- 
tained in the writing of the Jerusalem Jews, but this is 
not the case. We read in the sipnature of the letter: 
" The people. ... the council, and Judas."* It is 



1 IT Mach. ii, i6. 

'' II Mach. i, 3^. 

' II Mach. i, 36. 

* II Mach. ii, 14, 



THE BOOKS OF THE MACHABEES. 419 

supposed that this Judas is the Machabee. At first 
sight this supposition is very plausible, for the person- 
age of this name is best known in history and that most 
spoken of in the Second Book of Machabees. How- 
ever, when it is well established, as we believe of having 
demonstrated, that Antiochus of whom the Jews and 
Judas speak is Antiochus the Great, it follows that the 
supposition is false, and that this Judas is not the 
Machabee, for a contestable hypothesis cannot over- 
throw a truth soHdly proved. Besides, the author of 
the Second Book of Machabees seems to indicate him- 
self that the Judas of whom it speaks is not the son of 
Mathathias: after having quoted the letter where the 
name of Judas is read/ a few lines further on it begins 
with his own account in saying: " Now as concerning 
Judas Machabeus."^ This addition of the epithet of 
Machabeus seems to indicate that there is question of 
a Judas different from the one we come to speak of. 

But who was this Judas they ask? In fact we are 
not obliged to know and to explain this. We have 
such meager accounts about this epoch that one does 
not need to be astonished when we ignore who was 
such or such a personage, when we know only of its 
name. These cases are not rare. If the ecclesiastical 
authors had not taught us that Aristobolus, named in 
the same verse as Judas,^ had written on the Penta- 
teuch, we would know nothing about him, for Josephus 
has not mentioned him in his works. Hence, there is 
nothing surprising in not knowing the history of this 
Judas, although he has played a certain role. The 



^ II Mach. ii, 14. 
2 II Mach. ii, 20. 
^ II Mach. i, 10. 



420 DIFFICULTIES OF TFIE BIBLE. 

ignorance of a fact cannot overthrow the rest of the 
thesis, and one has no right to conclude that a writer 
has committed grave historical errors because he speaks 
of a personage who, having lived about 200 years B. C, 
is not mentioned in his account. For many centuries 
we knew only the name of Sargon, King of Ninive, 
on account of a cursory word made by the prophet 
Isaias.^ As this indication was an isolate one, several 
savants denied the existence of this monarch. They 
were wrong. We know to-day that this personage, 
unknown for a long time, has been one of the greatest 
kings of Assyria. Several other persons mentioned in 
the Books of Machabees are equally known to us only 
by name and by these books. 

7. THE MARTYRDOM OF THE SEVEN MACHABEAN 
BROTHERS. 

When we pass now to the objections made against 
the body of the account of the Second Book of Macha- 
bees, which is a summary of the history of Jason of 
Cyrene, the first we meet with has for object the 
martyrdom of the seven Machabean brothers. Antio- 
chus Epiphanes was not so cruel as the account pre- 
tends, they tell us, and he could not be present at the 
execution of the seven brothers at Jerusalem, because 
he was at Antioch at that time. 

The First Book of Machabees, the testimony of 
which is admitted by everybody, teaches us that Antio- 
chus Epiphanes decreed the pain of death on all who 
would observe the Jewish law;^ moreover, the orders 
which he gave to Lysias, in departing for Persia, to 
destroy and root out Israel, and to annihilate even its 

^ Is. XX, I. 

2 I Mach. i, 52. 



THE BOOKS OF THE MACHABEES. 421 

name, show his vehement exasperation against the 
Jews.^ How can one pretend that the author of the 
Second Book of Machabees calumniates, such a king in 
describing the torments which he inflicted on the seven 
martyrs. 

But, it is added, the- Seleucide king was then at 
Antioch, and consequently could not assist at their 
execution in the city of Jerusalem. 

According to the most common opinion of the 
Churches of the Orient and Occident, the scene of the 
martyrdom took place at Antioch, and an ancient tra- 
dition alone can explain why they transported far from 
Judea an event which one would place naturally at 
Jerusalem. But when one refuses to admit this tra- 
dition, from this it does not follow that Antiochus was 
not at Jerusalem during the martyrdom of the seven 
Machafeean brothers. Although the author had said 
before- that the king had returned to Antioch, it may 
be supposed that,^ without telling this explicitly, he 
had come back. This manner of writing is frequent 
with all the authors."^ 



8. THE LETTERS OF ANTIOCHUS V. EUPATOR AND OF 

LYSIAS. 

The second difficulty, and one of the most grievous 
which is offered by the Second Book of Machabees, 
is that which concerns the letters of Antiochus V. 
Eupator (163-162 B.. C.) and of Lysias. We read in 
the First Book of Machabees: " So Kins: Antiochus 



^ I Mah. iii, 34-36. 

- II Mcch. V, 21. 

^ II Mach. vii, i. 

* Cf. II Mach. vii, 1-42 and viii, 1-36; ix, i. 



42 2 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

(IV Epiphanes) died there in the year 163 B.C.). And 
Lysias understood that the king was dead and he set up 
Antiochus (V Eupator) his son to reign. "^ In the 
Second Book of Machabees,^ they quote letters of 
Antiochus V., already reigning, after the death of his 
father, and of Lysias his tutor. Now, they are dated 
from the year 148 of the era of the Seleucides; that of 
Antiochus V. indicates moreover, as epoch of its author- 
ship, the 15th of the so called xanthic month, that is, 
the sixth month of the Syro-Macedonian year, corres- 
ponding to the first month of the Jewish year called 
Nisan (March). 

Various savants, and Froehlich in particular, have 
shown that the author of the Second Book of Macha- 
bees commences the year six months later than the 
author of the First Book, because the latter writing 
in Hebrew, follows the Jewish calendar, the first month 
of which corresponds to the sixth Macedonian month, 
whilst the former, writing in Greek, follows the Mace- 
donian calendar, according to which the first month, 
dios, commences in October. This different manner 
to count produces a certain confusion in the minds of 
those who do not pay attention to this; but it explains 
the most of the chronological difficulties they have 
raised against the Second Book of Machabees, and in 
particular the apparent contradiction between the year 
of the death of Antiochus IV. which was the year 
149, according to the First Book of Machabees, and the 
arrival of Antiochus V., which took place in the year 
148, according to the Second' Book. It results from 
the date of the letter of Antiochus V., dated from 

^ I Mach. vi, i7. 
2 II Mach. xi. 



THE BOOKS OF THE MACHABEES. 423 

the xanthic month 148, that his father was dead at the 
commencement of this month, the Hebrew Nisan, 
or the sixth Macedonian month 148, according to the 
chronology of the First Book of Alachabees which com- 
mences with this month the year 149 of the Seleucides. 
Hence, no serious objection can be made in regard to 
this subject. 

But where the difficulty becomes aggravating, is 
when there is question of determining the date of the let- 
ter of Lysias. Chapter ten and the commencement of 
chapter eleven of the Second Book of Machabees relate, 
before reproducing the letters of Lysias and of Antio- 
chus v., different victories carried by the Machabees 
against the generals of the new King Antiochus V. 
and against Lysias himself, victories so important that 
Lysias and his king write to the Jews for terms of peace. 
Now, the letter of Lysias, written under the reign of 
Antiochus V., is dated from the 24th of Dioscor, 148, 
that is, between October and November, and conse- 
quently, it seems to be anterior more than three months 
to the death of Antiochus IV., which cannot be the case. 

Father Froehlich solves the objection in remarking 
that the Oriental histories do not always adhere in their 
exposition to the chronological order of facts. " AMio- 
ever will read carefully "chapter eleven of the Second 
Book of Machabees will notice, I believe," he says "that 
Ave have here an inversion of this kind, and that the 
letter of Lysias and the two letters of Antiochus Eupa- 
torhave not been written in the epoch in which they are 
placed in the account. In fact, the month of Dioscor 
of the year 148, date of the letter of Lysias, could not 
precede the xanthic month of this same year, which 
has been the first of the reign of Antiochus Eupator, 



424 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

and during which he wrote these two letters. There- 
fore, we must find in the xanthic month and in these 
two letters a place and an epoch which leave a suffi- 
cient interval for the fulfillment of the events related. 
, . . . (For this, it is sufficient to displace the letter 
of Lysias, and to admit that it is posterior of six months 
to the letters of Antiochus Eupator.) It is manifest, 
by the two Books of Machabees, that at the moment 
of the death of Antiochus IV. and of the arrival of 
Antiochus V. Eupator, the war had attained its full 
violence, and had been favorable to the Jews. Now, 
who ignores that the new princes, in mounting the 
throne, neglected nothing to enjoy peace at the com- 
mencement of their reign? This is the reason why 
Antiochus V. wrote to the victorious Jews, the 15th 
of the xanthic, at the beginning of his reign, to invite 
them to subscribe to a peace which would be advanta- 
geous to them, and to effect this he gave orders to 
Lysias, who was absent from court at that time. The 
very words which Antiochus addresses to Lysias prove 
the same thing: ' Our father being translated amongst 
the gods, we are desirous that they that are in our 
realm should live quietly,' etc.^ Hence he made 
peace with the Jews at the commencement of his 
reign, in the xanthic month of the year 148. At 
this moment — the sacred historian relates the fact 
in the same place as the arrival of Antiochus V. — 
Ptolemy Macer or Macron, prefect of Judea and of 
Phoenicia, a jmst man, conducted himself peaceably 
in regard to the Jews. Peace, therefore, put an 
end to the recent combats. But this peace cannot 
have been of long duration on account of the criminal 
^ Mach. X, 10-16. 



THE BOOKS OF THE MACHABEES. 425 

conduct of Lysias. The latter persecuted Ptolemy 
Macer in such a manner that he forced him to poison 
himself. Lysias, tutor of the king, succeeded him in 
his commandment; he violated the peace and renewed 
the war through the Gorgias.^ These events probably 
took place in the month of Artemisius (April). Since 
the middle of the month of Artemisius until the 20th of 
Dioscor, intercalated after the month of Hyperberety 
(September), there is a space of time sufficient to place 
the different combats delivered to the neighboring 
nations. After the defeat of the other generals of 
Antiochus Eupator, Lysias had time to come himself 
with a select body of his army and be beaten. Hence, 
it was during this half year, I believe, when those 
glorious events for the Jews took place, and of which 
there is question in the Second Book of Machabees, 
chapters ten and eleven. And we can remove to about 
the following year of the Greeks, 149, the military events 
of which speaks the First Book of Machabees, in the 
second part of chapter five, and the Second Book in 
chapter twelve. Finally, Lysias, conquered anew by 
the Jews at the commencement of autumn, the same 
Syro-Macedonian year 148 nearing its end, that is, the 
20th of the embolismic month of Dioscor, the last month 
of the year, was obhged to ask for peace by his letter. 
Thus, the whole seems to be in perfect accord and the 
difficulty deriving from the different messages disappear 
completely without that we are obliged to do violence 
to the text. 

" Thus, in summary, Antiochus IV. died in the 
Syro-Alacedonian year 148, the xanthic month or the 
month of Nisan having commenced; this is why the 

^ II Mach. X, 10-16. 



426 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

First Book of Machabees, according to its manner of 
counting, dates this event from the year 149. Antio- 
chus V. surnamed Eupator, son of Antiochus IV., suc- 
ceeded him immediately, and desirous to mark the 
beginnmg of his reign by peace, he wrote his letters on 
this subject to Lysias and to the Jews on the 15th of 
the xanthic month of the Syro-Macedonian year 148. 
Ptolemy Macer, partisan of the peace, poisoned himself 
shortly afterv/ards about the month of Artemius; 
Lysias succeeded him in the government of Phoenicia 
and Judea and behold the peace; the war lasted six 
months; Lysias, conquered after his generals, was 
forced to ask anew for peace by his letter to the Jews, 
dated from the 20th of the embolismic month of Dios- 
cor, the last of the year 148 of the Syro-Macedonians."^ 
All the other objections they raise against the 
Second Book of Machabees are of little importance, and 
do not merit to be discussed: they are improbabilities 
or exaggerations, for example, they say, in number 
of enemies killed in the combat delivered by the Jews 
against the Syrian armies.^ For the pretended im- 
probable facts, criticism cannot prove in any manner 
that it has a right to reject them as aprocryphal facts. 
That the inhabitants of Joppe did drown Jews in the 
sea,^ what is there impossible in this? That Razias 
rather killed himself than to fall into the hands of his 
enemies/ what is there incredible? As to the number 
of the dead who perished in the battles, one may admit, 
if he wishes, that the figures have been increased by the 
copyists in this book as in several others. 



* E. Froelich, Annales Comfendiciarii reffum Syriae^ p. 26-28. 
^ II Mach. viii, 24, 30; x, 23, 31 ; xi, 11 ; xii, 19, 26, 28; xv, 27. 

' II Mach. xii, 3-4. 

* II Mach. xiv, 37-46. 



THE BOOKS OF THE MACHABEES. 427 

9. THE ANNIVERSARY OF THE BIRTH OF ANTIOCHUS 
EPIPHANES. 

Finally, another objection made against the Second 
Book of Machabees is completely false. The sacred 
author reports that they forced the Jews to celebrate 
" every month "^ the anniversary of the birth of Antio- 
chus Epiphanes. As to this subject Mr. Grimm says: 
" Every month means that if the king, for example, was 
born on the 6th of xanthic, the sixth day of the eleven 
other months was also celebrated as his birthday. We 
find nowhere an example of a similar ordinance, and it 
can hardly be believed tha"" such a decree was published 
by Antiochus Epiphanes. This also explains the omission 
" every month " by the Vulgate, although this reading 
is found in all the Greek manuscripts, in Theodoret and 
in the Syriac version. It seems to me that the sacred 
historian has mixed up and confounded that what con- 
cerned the annual celebration of the king's birthday 
with that what had reference to the sacrifice of the 
25th of each month of which the First Book of Macha- 
bees speaks."^ 

In reality the author of the Second Book of Macha- 
bees has nothing mixed up and confounded; he was 
very well acquainted with the facts. The reproach 
made to the sacred author is, on the contrary, a proof 
of his exactitude. Examples of similar ordinances are 
existing, however extraordinary they may appear. 
Epigraphy establishes that the King of Syria did not 
content himself with an annual anniversary, but that he 



* II Mach. vi, 7. 

"^ I Mach. i, 59 (Vulgate, 62). — W.Grimm, " Handbuch zuden. 
Apokrrphen," vol. iv. p. iio-iii. 



428 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

prescribed a monthly anniversary. The custom of the 
monthly anniversary was, indeed, a constant one for 
all the successors of Alexander. We recover the 
same custom in Egypt/ at Pergamum,^ finally at tlie 
last successors of the Seleucides, the Antiochus of 
Commagene.'^ Therefore, it cannot be questioned that 
the kings of Syria had also monthly anniversaries. 



CHAPTER XXXVIII. 



THE PSALMS. 

THE attacks of the infidels against the Psalms 
regard either their origin, or the doctrine of these 
sacred chants. 

I. The Council of Trent in its canon of the Sacred 
Books, calls the Book of the Psalms Psalterium Davidis; 
did it mean to tell thereby that all the Psalms are from 
David? Certainly not, for it is sufficient to read the 
Psalter to recognize, in the style, contents and title 
even of different Psalms, that they cannot be all attrib- 
uted to David: some are anterior to him, others saw the 
light only a long time after him; but as the Vulgate 
attributes to the king-prophet eighty-eight Psalms, 
of which two only (Ps. xlii and cxxxvi) can be refused 
to him, the Fathers of the Council have added the name 
of David to the Psalter as that of the principal author, 
and this in virtue of the well known principle: major 

^ Decree of Canope, L. 26; Decree of Rosette, L. 52. 

2 Hermes, 1873, P- "5» L. 35. 

*'' O. Hamdy-Bey, The tumulus of Nimrad, Dagh. col. iii, L. 115. 



THE PSALMS. 429 

pars trahit ad se minorem. This being the case, one can 
hardly explain the pains which some infidels take to 
estabHsh that the Catholics are deceived by attributing 
all the Psalms to David. 

" Tradition," says Vernes, '' pronomices the name 
of David with the same ignorant candor which makes 
it place the name of Moses at the head of the Penta- 
teuch, and to place under the cover of Solomon the 
Proverbs, the Ecclesiastes and the Canticle of Canti- 
cles." In reality the tradition of which the critic speaks 
reduces itself to the opinion of a few Fathers, whose 
sentiments never found an authority in regard to this 
point, for St. Jerome said already in the fourth century: 
" Let it be known that one is deceived by attributing 
all the Psalms to David, and not to the authors whose 
name they carry." As to this point Reuss, a Rational- 
ist, follows only Catholic tradition; but he goes further 
than this, let us say too far, in designating the epoch 
of the Machabees as that of the composition of the most 
of the Psalms. Undoubtedly, he is forced, in his system, 
to have recourse to this hypothesis, for one could hardly 
explain the existence of Psalms in an epoch in which 
the RationaUsts show us the Hebrews as subject to all 
the errors of polytheism, to all the abuses of the inhu- 
man w^orship of the false gods. But how must one tor- 
ture the text to arrive at a similar result ! The Psalms 
are the history of God's people related from day to day 
by the poets, they are great events of the Books of 
Kings, and even of the Pentateuch, related and com- 
mented upon by men, who certainly were eye-witnesses 
thereof, for one feels them under the stroke of the pro- 
found impressions which these events excited in their 
soul. But as this inconveniences the Rationalists, thev 



430 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

are obliged to deny these events; there where tradition 
has always seen, for example, the anguishes of David 
persecuted by his enemies, the new criticism beholds 
nothing else but the anxieties of the Hebrew people 
oppressed by a foreign nationality, in the epoch of the 
Ptolemies or of the Seleucides, in the moment of the 
persecutions of Antiochus and the rising of the Macha- 
bees. 

The reason for this change, we have seen, is the 
need of the cause; as to the pretext, behold it stated by 
Mr. Vernes: " It is against all probability," he says, " to 
make a book to preserve the reflection of circumstances 
peculiar to an individual; this book, on the contrary, 
is better understood when it expresses the anguishes, 
the fears and hopes of an entire people." It is Mr. 
Vernes himself who furnishes to us the refutation of 
this little serious reason, in quoting the following pas- 
sage of Reuss: " Other (Psalms) expressed in the 
beginning, the individual and momentary sentiments 
of their authors, but in a manner that many other per- 
sons, placed in similar circumstances, could appropriate 
both the spirit and words of them." Behold, expressed 
by a Rationalist and repeated by Mr. Vernes, the use- 
fulness of these Psalms which one can call individual. 

We content ourselves with this general refutation; 
to render it more complete we would have to examine 
each Psalm one after another, which would lead us too 
far. However,let us observe that when Reuss, in order 
to justify his theory, has tried to apply it to each Psalm 
in particular, this attempt has been so unfortunate 
that Mr. Vernes cannot help saying: '' In this regard 
we would have liked sometimes more rigor in the dis- 
cussion." 



THE PSALMS. 43 I 

2. As to the doctrine itself of the Psalms, it has been 
attacked also as well as their origin, i. The Psalmist, 
they said, ignores a future life: ''The dead will not 
praise Thee, O Lord,'' says the Psalms xciii. In re- 
gard to this subject we can refer only to another chapter 
'VThe Book of Ecclesiastes," where we sufhciently 
establish the belief of the Hebrews in the immortality of 
the soul. As to the words of the Psalm cxiii, they sup- 
pose in no manner the death of the soul, and are not a 
denial of the future life, but the authentication of 
the impotency in which were the saints of the Old 
Testament to praise God in Limbo; it is certain that 
before Jesus Christ had opened the gates of heaven 
to the just souls, the latter could not enjoy the 
intuitive vision, and, consequently, death had for 
them a particular horror. 2. Another reproach 
formulated against the Psalms concerns the impreca- 
tions, sometimes very violent, which are formulated 
therein against the enemies of God's people. To this 
we can answer that, the enemies of the Hebrew people 
being those of God himself, to desire their punishment 
was nothing else but taking into their hands the inter- 
ests of the Lord. Besides, the so-called hatred manifested 
by the Psalmists has reference a good deal more to the 
sin than to the sinner; and when sometimes the sinner 
himself appears to be attacked, we must remember that 
the Jewish law was not perfect; the strict law of justice 
should be replaced by the more perfect law of charity. 
In summary, one objects nothing that is repugnant to 
the divine inspiration of the Psalms; now this inspira- 
tion is the only thing which the Church imposes for 
our belief in regard to these writings. 



CHAPTER XXXIX. 



THE BOOK OF PROVERBS. 

A GENERAL accusation is made against the Book 
of Proverbs. Its contents are said to be of 
human conception, but vulgar and disedifying in pur- 
port. " The wise Solomon," said the Emperor Julian, 
" is he worthy to be compared to the Greek Proclydes, 
with Theognides or Socrates? Ah, why! If you com- 
pare the exhortations of Socrates with Proverbs, you 
will find, I am sure, the son of Theodore superior to 
the most wise of the kings." Voltaire is stih more 
envenomed against the Proverbs. He says: '' It is a' 
collection of maxims, which appear to our refined minds 
sometimes trivial, low, incoherent, without taste, with- 
out choice, and without design. . . . Is it to a 
great king, to the wisest of the mortals, that one can 
dare to impute such follies? " All the men of good 
faith have at all times acknowledged the merits of the 
Book of Proverbs. 

Thanks to the Old Testament, and especially to 
the New Testament, the doctrine taught by the Book 
of Proverbs has become familiar to us, and it has been 
perfected by Jesus Christ. But because the teachings 
of the Savior are much more beautiful and refined than 
the Proverbs of Solomon, it does not follow at all that 
the maxims of the son of David are neither noble nor 
(432) 



THE BOOK OF PROVERBS. 433 

worthy of the Holy Ghost. In a collection of this kind, 
which is general in its teaching, there are necessarily 
counsels which apply to all the conditions of life; there 
must be advice given within the intelHgence of the 
ignorant as well as the learned, for the weak as well as 
for the strong; the wise king addresses himself to all, 
and speaks for all; hence, he cannot always embellish 
his language so as to indicate and not speak plainly his 
meaning and still be understood by everyone; the 
author addresses the mean as well as the mighty; he 
speaks to the children in the language of youthful 
understanding, and to the men, with the stern, rigorous 
voice of a man. But his language is always that of 
prudence and truth. Julian the apostate, compares 
him with the gnomic writers of antiquity, to belittle him 
by the comparison. His judgment is quite unjust. 
Nothing proves better the excellency of the Book of 
Proverbs than the comparison of his maxims with those 
of the pagan wisdom. From Phoclydes to Marcus 
Aurelius, although the latter had breathed somewhat 
of the Christian atmosphere, all are greatly inferior to 
the son of David. Who is the one among them sufili- 
ciently elevated in mind to have given us as a model of 
moral life, this principle which is the first precept of the 
Book of Proverbs: *' The fear of God is the beginning 
of wisdom? " Human philosophy had seen very well 
that virtue consists in the happy medium between two 
extremes; but no pagan philosopher or Solon ever 
existed who occupied in his teachings this point of 
vantage. Errors of dogma and morals, excesses of so- 
called virtue and vice were ever present in the greatest 
of writers and teachers, while in Solomon, on the con- 
trary, there is nothing to eliminate, nothing to change. 

D. B.— 28 



434 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Theognides, the gnostic poet par excellence, who lived 
about 450 B. C, has left us in about 700. distiches which 
have escaped the ravages of time, a sort of moral code, 
but it is inspired by a defiant, bitter, and melancholy 
wisdom, which scarcely sees other than the evil side of 
man. Epictetes, the greatest of the pagan moralists, 
knows not how to advise man in his actions of life, but 
summarized his philosophy in the famous maxim: 
** Suffer, abstain." The most wise among the pagans 
have made only a vague acknowledgment of heavenly 
mercy and justice; and of the virtue of resignation. 
They advise the sufferer to consider his woes an illusion, 
and thus to obtain strength and comfort in self-decep- 
tion; never did the idea enter their mind to invite us, 
as does Solomon, to seek in the thought of God a sweet 
occupation of the heart, to consider this thought a 
resting place, a refuge, a harbor for the storm-tossed 
ship of life. The doctrine of the author of the Proverbs 
is, therefore, much superior to that of the profane 
moralists. It is not yet the full day of the Gospel, but 
it is already its dawn. From that time God appears 
to us as a Father even in his chastisements: "Whom 
the Lord loveth, he chastiseth, as a father in the son 
he pleaseth himself." (Prov. Ill, 12.) 



CHAPTER XL. 



THE BOOK OF BCCLESIASTES. 

THE infidels accuse the doctrine of Ecclesiastes of 
being impregnated with the most grievous philo- 
sophical errors: they pretend it to be in doctrine Epicu- 
rian, Sceptic, Materialistic and Pessimist. 

I. EPICURIANISM. 

What is the course man should follow in passing 
through the struggles of this life? The only answer 
which Ecclesiastes gives to this question, the Rational- 
ist tells us, is that we must enjoy the passing hour. 
And this is the " sensual enjoyment, the pleasure of 
eating and drinking and ihe contemplation of beautiful 
things." The following passages especially are those 
which have given pretext to the accusations of the infi- 
dels: Ecc. H, 24; ix, 7, etc. These texts and similar 
ones do not prove at all that the author of Ecclesiastes 
was an Epicurian. Certainly, we do not find in Eccle- 
siastes a panegyric of penance and mortification on 
earth, but neither do we find this in the other books. 
of the Old Testament. The Jews, without ignoring the 
future retribution, attached a greater value to the 
earthly goods than the Christians whose greatest earthly 
treasures were comprised in the promises made by God 
to His people. Hence, there is nothing astonishing in 
beholding Cohelet (Ecclesiastes) complacently engaged 

(435) 



436 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

in earthly enjoyments; but to be Epicurean he would 
have to be obUged to consider these enjoyments as an 
end, as the end of man, and it is precisely this which he 
does not do, in fact, he condemns in a formal manner 
the abuse of the pleasures, repeatedly cautions that all 
this will be followed by death and judgment. 

2. SCEPTICISM. 

The author of Ecclesiastes is not a sceptic. The 
Rationalist, however, makes this accusation, when he 
says: " The dominating character of the author is scepti- 
cism. He has no firm conviction." The fact is, how- 
ever, that he believes without hesitation in all the great 
fundamental truths; in the existence of God; in the 
obligation to live conformably to the moral law; he 
hopes for a just retribution for the actions of men, and 
acknowledges that God has disposed of all things. He 
does not even suggest these things as problematical; 
he asks only whether man can enjoy perfect happiness 
on earth and find in the enjoyments of study what he 
cannot find elsewhere (viii, 16-17), and he answers that 
our spirit is incapable, not to discover and know the 
truth, but, what is quite different, to search into the 
why and wherefore of things. Now, who to-day can 
deny that human intelligence is Hmited, or that nature 
is for us replete with enigmas and mysteries? 

3. MATERIALISM. 

But when the author of Ecclesiastes was not sceptic, 
was he at least materialistic? ''This book," says one 
critic, " can be considered as the breviary of the most 
advanced modern materialism." Undoubtedly in 



THE BOOK OF ECCLESIASTES. 437 

several places (xii, 7, etc.), the author distinguishes 
explicitly the body from the soul; but, say the infidels, 
he denies or questions at least the immortality of the 
soul, the future life. Now, what reasons do they give 
for these assertions: i. Faith in the immortality was not 
yet known, says one, consequently the Cohelet must, 
like his contemporaries, ignore the immortality of the 
soul. To this objection Renan himself answers: '' In 
two or three places one might believe that the author 
sinks himself into pure materialism, but all on a sudden 
he rises with an elevated accent. . . . Cohelet does 
not forget God's judgment."^ 2. To establish that 
Solomon did not believe in another life, the following 
text is quoted: "Therefore, the death of man, and 
of beasts, is one, and the condition of them both is 
equal; as man dieth, so they also die; all things 
breathe alike, and man hath nothing more than beast, 
all things are subject to vanity. And all things go to 
one place; of earth they were made, and into earth they 
return together. Who knoweth if the spirit of the 
children of Adam ascend upward, and if the spirit of the 
beasts descend downward?" (iii, 19-21). It is especially 
upon the interpretation of the last verse that the ma- 
terialists claim is established. It can be explained in 
the sense that there are few who know exactly what 
becomes of the soul after death. The Hebrew Bible 
in the edition of the Massorets contains this verse: 
'' Who knoweth the spirit of man which ascends up- 
ward and the spirit of the beast which descends down- 
wards?" The massoretic meaning which is not difficult 
of interpretation. Is much preferable. Hence, the 



1 E. Renan, " PEcclesiaste," p. 87- 



438 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

sacred author means to say: How many men are there 
that dwell seriously on the future of the soul! 

Besides, there are many passages wherein Ecclesi- 
astes affirms explicitly his faith in an after life and in 
the final reward.^ Therefore, the author of Ecclesiastes 
believed in another life, and a contrary assertion can 
only find support in a single verse of doubtful meaning. 

4. PESSIMISM. 

A final accusation against the author of Ecclesiastes 
is Pessimism. The Pessimists, since the invention of 
their system, have pretended to claim the author of this 
book as one of their own. It is true that. Ecclesiastes 
describes the disenchantments of life with a melancholic 
eloquence, which produces the most profound impres- 
sion. But the Pessimism of this book is much different 
from that of our contemporary philosophers. The 
latter are materialists and atheists, and the former 
believes firmly in vice and virtue; in a life beyond the 
grave; in a personal God (iii, 4-18), who will judge the 
good and the bad, these are so many irreconcilable 
beliefs repudiated by Pessimism which is one of the 
maladies of our century. 

For the rest, to show how false are the accusations 
brought up against the Book of Ecclesiastes, it is only 
necessary to call the reader's attention to the following 
verses: Eccl. iii, 11 (13; ii, 24, 18; vi, 2; ix, 7); iii, 17, 
V, 3, 5; vii, 19, 30; viii, 2; 12-13; ix, ^'^^l 9'^ ^^l i; I3-I4- 
" Fear God and keep His commandments: for this is all 
man, for God will bring into judgment whether it will 

' Cf. Eccl. iii, 16-17, xii, 7i P^- Ixxxix, 49; xxxi, 18; Ixxxviii, 
6, 7, 13; xciv, 17; Ixxxviii, i; Job xxx, 23. The Psalms are quoted 
according to the Hebrew. 



THE CANTICLE OF CANTICLES. 439 

be good or evil," are the words of the last two verses, 
and indicate beyond question the true belief of the 
writer. An author who expresses such sentiments is 
far from being an Epicurian, Sceptic, Materialist or 
Pessimist. This is so manifestly true that the enemies 
of the Scripture, in order to incriminate the author of 
Ecclesiastes pretend that the epilogue was added after- 
wards and by another hand. 



CHAPTER XLL 



T 



THE CANTICLE OF CANTICLES. 

HIS Biblical Book, when one adheres to the bark 
of the letter, is a nuptial song, under the form of 
a dialogue between groom and bride. But in reality 
of what nuptial is there question here? The Church 
has always believed that the covenant of which there 
is question in the Canticle was a quite spiritual alliance, 
as that of the Savior with His Church. Some, it is 
true, admit a double sense in the Canticle, the one 
literal, celebrating the union of Solomon with the 
daughter of the King of Egypt, and the other mystical, 
elevating itself above flesh and blood to consider only 
the divine alliance with Jesus Christ and the Church. 
But whilst Bossuet, Calmet, etc., ably defended this 
mystic sense, the most of the Catholics wished to 
behold in the Canticle only an allegory, a simple parable, 
having only a celestial meaning and no material mean- 
ing. One believes that the allegorical school is right, 
with Origen, St. Jerome. St. Bernard, etc., and that it 



440 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

is more true and respectful to behold in the Canticle 
only a parable as that of the mutual feasts, or that of 
the prudent and foolish virgins; but be this as it may, 
the two opinions we have exposed can be maintained, 
for both elevate themselves, although in different 
degrees, above the sensible love, and they acknowledge- 
in the Canticle a useful aim, a divine end which justifies 
its canonicity. 

There is a third interpretation, which is admis- 
sible; this consists in recognizing in the book in question 
only an exclusively literal sense. For the adherents 
of this system the Canticle is an epithalamium, a 
wedding song and nothing more. Did the author 
wish to celebrate the marriage with the Sulamite, or 
simply the union of a shepherd with a shepherdess? 
Have we before us a drama, as Renan wished, or a 
** collection of erotic poetries," according to the theory 
of Reuss? Behold the only questions which divide 
our contemporary Rationalistic critics; as to the ques- 
tion to know whether there is a mystic sense under the 
letter, there is nothing of the kind for the Rationalists; 
for them the Canticle is " the purely literary com- 
position, without mixture of any religious element, that 
may have arrived to us from Jewish antiquity." It is 
Mr. Vernes that speaks thus. 

Outside the authority of the Church two reasons 
are decisive to make us reject this literal theory: 
I. Never would the Canticle have figured in the Canon 
of the Scriptures, if since the beginning one would not 
have known that it contained something else but a 
wedding song. The Jews inserted into their Canon 
only sacred books, and, for having introduced therein 
the Canticle, they must have seen a spiritual sense 



THE CANTICLE OF CANTICLES. 44 1 

therein, a union more elevated and holier than that 
expressed by the letter of the text; also no Targumist 
beheld therein a purely literal meaning. After the 
synagogue the Church has always followed in the 
interpretation of the Canticle,. the maxim of our Savior: 
" It is the spirit that quickens, the flesh serves to 
nothing." She has condemned the literal system since 
the year 553, for not our actual critics are the inventors 
thereof; finally, she has made such a usage thereof in 
her Hturgy and in her teaching, that it is sufficient to 
read the offices in honor of Mary and the explanations 
of her doctors, for example, the letters of direction of 
Bossuet, to recognize the truth of the spiritual sense, 
and to be struck by its beauty. 2. It ought to cost so 
much less to recognize in the Canticle a mystic sense, 
as " nothing is more common in the Bible than the 
pictures of husband and wife, employed to render, 
under an expressive form, the union of the soul with 
God, of the chosen people with its master and king " 
(Mgr. Freppel). And, indeed, for the prophets, the 
Jewish nation is a bride chosen by God, sometimes faith- 
ful and sometimes adulterous (Jer. ii, 2; Ezech. xvi, 3 
ff.); for St. Paul the Church is the spouse of Jesus 
Christ (Eph. v, 31); for St. John spiritual nuptials are 
prepared to the Lamb in heaven (Apoc. xix, 7) ; finally, 
Jesus Christ Himself compares the kingdom of heaven 
who go to meet the groom and the bride (Mat. xxv, i). 
Therefore, there is nothing more natural than to admit, 
in the case that occupies us, an assimilation of the same 
kind, and to acknowledge that the inspired author has 
chosen the most beautiful and the most profound of 
human affections to give us a picture of the alliance of 
souls with God. 



CHAPTER XLII. 



THE BOOK OF JOB. 

THE Book of Job is one of the most beautiful monu- 
ments of literature and an ideal of a Semitic poem. 
But is this magnificent poem a history or a fiction? 
The Church has always believed in the real existence of 
the Arab patriarch. Some ancient Rabbis have main- 
tained, to the contrar}^, that the Book of Job is only a 
long parable, and the personage whose trials it relates 
was not a real man. In our days, a certain number of 
Rationalists also pretend that the poem of Job is a 
fiction, like the Iliad and Odyssey. They even imagine 
to recognize therein the work of several hands, like in 
the writings of Homer. To believe them the prologue 
and the conclusion are posterior additions. The dis- 
courses of Eliu, they say, are not authentic and form no 
part of the primitive poem. 

It is generally admitted by the Catholic authors that 
the Book of Job has been embelHshed with poetic orna- 
ments, but all are agreed in acknowledging its founda- 
tion as historic. It is this that Scripture itself teaches 
us when it gives us Job as a model of patience, in the 
prophet Ezechiel (xiv, 14, 20), in the Book of Tobias 
(ii, 12) and in the Epistle of St. James (v, 11). Nothing 
in the Biblical account authorizes us to deny the real 
existence of the holy patriarch of Idumea. A discus- 
sion of the subject will readily prove this point. 
(442) 



THE BOOK OF JOB, 443 

FIRST OBJECTION. 

All the details of the history of Job have no proba- 
bility it is stated. — That the misfortunes of Job are not 
within the usual province of human ills no one will deny. 
But '' if the case of Job is most extraordinary, in what- 
ever sense one may imagine it, the lesson it teaches will 
apply itself so- much more easily to all other cases." 
It is M. Reuss, a RationaHst, who makes this remark. 
God permits that His servant is subjected quite on a 
sudden to the most distressing trials, in order that his 
example might justify more manifestly His Providence, 
and that the lesson might be more significant. 

SECOND OBJECTION. 

One wishes to behold contradictions between the 
Job of the prologue and the Job of the discussion. In- 
asmuch as the one is resigned, they assure us, so much 
is the other impatient, almost blasphemous, which evi- 
dences that the poet fashions the personage at will and 
does not even pretend to make him consistent with him- 
self. These accusations are very unjust, and it is Reuss 
himself who again furnishes their refutation. 

" Job the pious and just man is put on trial, and 
the history tells us that he sustained it. He is oppressed 
by pain; but he remains firm and faithful, not only in 
face of his personal misfortunes, but also, and what is 
greater, in face of the suspicions of his life-long friends 
who accuse him of hypocrisy and who treat him very 
uncharitably. From them and their unjust judgment, 
he always calls upon God; he does not cease to address 
himself to the One who alone can justify and console 
him. When doubt comes to assail him, he combats it 
and triumphs over it; and when momentarily he appears 



444 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

to give way to despair, it is solely because he believes God 
whom he seeks and whom he invokes does not wish to 
hear him. There is not in this, to tell the truth, any 
trace of incredulity, of an impious denial. On the con- 
trary, at the same moment when the thought of his 
misery torments him most vividly, when he complains 
most bitterly of being abandoned, forgotten, despised 
by those who were his best friends, his faith shows itself 
most gloriously immovable, and he expresses the convic- 
tion that God will restore his name, were this even only 
after death. Hence, the really pious man will emerge 
victoriously from the trial, when he has to do with God 
alone, and when he does not permit the prejudiced 
utterances of others to disconcert and mislead him. 
He recognizes that God does not desire his misfortune, 
but that He permits it with the intention indicated. 
. Also, Job, towards the end, recovers his moral 
equilibrium, the tranquility of mind, as soon as his 
adversaries are silenced; and, in lamenting his lot, and 
in protesting his innocence, he expresses himself in a 
manner so touching that the reader, who might have 
been shocked at certain too vehement expressions, 
returns without difficulty • to his first sentiments " 
(Reuss, Job, 24). 

THIRD OBJECTION. 

The friends of Job are not real personages, they are 
only fictitious they tell us. Reuss comes again to 
prove the contrary. '' They are three," he says (Op. 
cit. p. 17-18), "but they do not represent three philo- 
sophic systems or three diverse solutions, even they 
do not place themselves in three different points of 
view, as is generally the case in our dramas, where each 
personage has his particular role. For the most, we 



THE BOOK OF JOB 445 

can say that one of them speaks with more modera- 
tion, the others with passion and vehemence: in the 
main they say the same thing. . . . The discourses 
of the three friends are replete with repetitions. It is 
constantly the same topic: God punishes the wicked; 
misfortune is the punishment of sin; man is not wiser 
than God. . . . From his part, Job also returns 
continually to his protestation of innocence; he always 
affirms that he has not merited his lot. . . . The 
author describes this, not as a philosopher would do, 
producing thesis after thesis and demonstrating them 
by a logical and connected argumentation, so as to 
approach insensibly his end, and to finish by imposing 
conclusions upon his readers. He puts into the scene 
living personages; each one having his convictions and 
prejudices. They do not come at an understanding*; 
what one affirms the other denies, and no decision is 
arrived at either as to the cause of Job's suffering or the 
means he should adopt to alleviate them." 

FOURTH OBJECTION. 

The improbabiHty of the epilogue is especially in- 
sisted on, according to which God gives to the just 
Job double what he possessed before the trial: twice the 
number of sheep, camels, oxen, and asses, and twice 
as many sons and daughters. But what is there im- 
possible in this? In all the epochs of histories we meet 
VN^ith singularities not less improbable. The descent 
of Hugo Capet has given successively to France three 
branches of kings; each one extinguished itself with 
three brothers who reigned one after another. Were 
we to meet a similar fact in sacred history, the critics 
would not fail to cry out that it was impossible and 



446 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

improbable, and the- credulity and simplicity of people 
who believed such an assertion was to be pitied, etc., 
but the truth would be none the less incontestable. It 
is the same with the restoration of the fortune of Job. 

FIFTH OBJECTION. 

The critical spirit is so punctilious that it even finds 
fault with the names Job gives to his daughters after 
the return of his fortune. Because they are borrowed 
from graceful objects, it is concluded that they must 
have been '' forged willfully by the poet." Who, how- 
ever, does not know among those that are somewhat 
famihar with the Oriental customs, that similar names 
are there quite ordinary and common? Job calls his 
three daughters, the first '' Jemimah," in Arabic, '* the 
dove," on account of her dove-Uke eyes; the second 
" Qesiah," because she appears Hke wrapped up with 
the perfume of " cannell," and the third " Qeren- 
happuk," from the name of the principal cosmetic of 
feminine beauty, because her beauty must have become 
still greater by art (Job xlii, 14). The Greeks would 
have compared them to the Three Graces; Job compares 
them to the most beloved objects of the Orientals, and 
he names them accordingly. Even in the present 
day in Arabia and Persia, women are named from grace- 
ful animals, flowers, perfumes. and precious stones, and 
it is not infrequently that one hears young girls named 
as they are in the " Thousand and One Nights" : Gar- 
den Flower, Coral Branch, Sugar Cane, Day Light, 
Morning Star, etc. 

Hence, the Book of Job is historical in its ensemble 
and principal points, in spite of the poetic frame in which 
it is placed, and the literary ornaments by which it is 



THE BOOK OF JOB. 44/ 

embellished. As to the date when it was written, this 
is a mere matter of discussion and we have not, conse- 
quently, any need to enter it into our inquiry. 

6. AUTHENTICITY OF THE DIVERS PARTS OF THE 
BOOK OF JOB. 

Let US establish now the authenticity of the parts 
of the Book of Job which are contested or denied by the 
infidels, that is, the prologue and the epilogue, the 
discourse of Eliu. 

In regard to the parts in prose which serve as an 
introduction and conclusion to the work, the infidels 
themselves acknowledge that we cannot separate them 
from the body of the Book, and that, consequently, they 
have always been attached to it. 

When the prologue and epilogue are authentic for 
the less extreme Rationalists, nearly all Rationalists 
denounce the discourses of Eliu as an interpolation of 
a much later date. '^This portion," they say, '' does 
not fit Avith the general plan; what God reproaches in 
Job is quite different from that which Eliu blames in 
him; Eliu is named neither in the prologue nor in the 
epilogue." 

It is true that EHu is named neither in the pro- 
logue nor in the epilogue, but the reason is simply 
because the author had no object in naming him. The 
rule which he follows is to mention nobody who is not 
directly interested in the part of the narrative under 
relation. It is thus that the brothers of Job are named 
accidentally in one of his discourses; his parents are 
mentioned for the first time in the last chapter. The 
poet speaks of the friends of Job at the beginning to 
show that they came to console him, and at the end to 



448 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

show that the reproaches which they made to the suf- 
ferer were without foundation in the judgment of God 
Himself; but EUu was not an intimate friend of Job, 
he was simply an assistant to the discussion, whose 
presence one did not need to indicate, a young man 
who, in accordance with Oriental custom, remained in 
the background, observing silence while those older 
than he were speaking; when asked for his opinion he en- 
tered into the conversation. Moreover, EHu, different 
in this respect from Eliphaz, Baldad and Sophar, states 
only what is just and true, and consequently in the con- 
clusion, as Job has nothing to reproach him with, there 
is no need for the author to speak of him. He is the 
only one of the interlocutors named who does not err 
in his judgments of Job. The objections made against 
his role are European or American objections, which 
would never have occurred to the mind of an Oriental. 
The latter would not care about having the last word. 
As soon as he has nothing important any more to tell 
he keeps silence. 

Very far from not fitting in with the " general plan," 
very far from being an outside work '' without which 
the poem would remain not less complete," the dis- 
courses of Eliu round out the justification of Prov- 
idence, such as it could be effectuated before the law 
of grace: they develop a new explanation which would 
be placed neither in the mouth of the friends of 
Job nor in the mouth of God, namely, the usefulness 
of suffering to purify man and to instruct him. The 
three friends of Job have maintained that, if he is 
afflicted it is because he has merited all suffering as a 
chastisement. Job protests against this accusation; 
he affirms his innocence with the greatest energy, and 



THE BOOK OF JOB. 449 

the conclusion derived from his statements is, that he 
does not know why God afflicts him, because he has 
no fauh to reproach himself with. God will not tell 
him, for He will not demean Himself to justify His 
conduct before man. It is enough that Job has to 
how down under the weight of God's majesty and the 
spectacle of His magnificence. Pope justly reproached 
Milton for having been wanting in respect towards God 
and for having been guilty of bad taste in putting into 
His mouth theses and arguments. The Book of Job 
does not make this mistake. God speaks as a master, 
and what should have been said by the friends of the 
unhappy Job is said by Eliu. The latter reveals to the 
holy patriarch the secret of his trials in showing to him 
in the affliction a means to purify and perfect himself. 
Thus the intervention of Eliu is far from being useless 
and inexplicable. Without these discourses the justifi- 
cation of Providence, which is the object of the poem, 
would be incomplete and imperfect. In showing how 
God permits that afflictions are visited upon the just 
to make him watchful against sin, when he has not 
fallen, or when he has fallen, to excite to repent- 
ance, he exposes truths of the greatest impor- 
ance and of the greatest practical usefulness. It 
is not true that all suffering is the chastisement 
for crime, as the friends of Job maintained; but 
we cannot agree with Job neither, when he says that 
God is unjust when He visits afflictions upon the inno- 
cent, for it is for the good of the just that God permits 
that the one who has not offended Him is afflicted. 
The correct understanding of these discourses of Eliu 
is, therefore, far from furnishing a proof that they are 
not authentic. 

D. B.--29 



CHAPTER XLIII. 



THE PROPHET DA VID. 

AMONG the personages of the Old Testament who 
are the o1)ject of universal veneration there is 
none that has been more abused by the modern infidels 
than King David. This great man has not always been 
a saint; there are stains in his Ufe, but he has effaced 
them by his presence, and he is one of the most beautiful 
examples of God's mercy towards the '''contrite and 
humble " sinners (Ps. li, 19). No matter; Rationalism 
cannot pardon him for having been one of the most 
illustrious faithful of the Old Testament and one of the 
chief instruments of which God made use to prepare, a 
long time beforehand, the advent of Christianity; infi- 
delity seeks to lower and to degrade him. None has 
gone further in his hatred against David than Renan; 
he surpasses all his infidel friends by his violence, or by 
the brutality of his attacks against this holy man. The 
historic sympathies of, the infidels are something 
remarkable. Renan has labored his whole lifetime, 
on the one hand, to reinstate Satan, Cain, Saul and 
Judas Iscariot, and on the other, to lower David, St. 
John and St. Paul. An irresistible penchant carried 
him towards the first and separated him from the 
second. 
(450) 



THE PROPHET DAVID. 45 I 

Ed. Retiss, although a RationaHst, points out with 
right, several characteristics which justify the glory 
of David, and thus condemns the excesses of Renan. 
But also this author is far from rendering complete 
justice to the founder of the Hebrew monarchy, to the 
pious king who conceived the project to raise a temple 
to Jehovah in Jerusalem, and who organized with such 
a splendor the liturgical chant and public worship, to 
the inspired poet who, in spite of all one may say 
against him, was " the exquisite chanter of Israel," the 
author of the most beautiful Psalms. To make the 
attempt to rob David of the glory of having composed 
a part of our sacred chants is one of the most foolish 
undertakings of modern infidelity. If David has not 
composed Psalms, there is not a single fact certain in 
the history of the past. Pindar has not written his 
Ode, and Virgil is not the author of the Eneid. 

I. THE HOLINESS OF DAVID'S LIFE. 

However, even supposing that David would not 
have left to us any poetical composition, the Church 
would not have a less right to consider him as a saint. 
Undoubtedly, these Psalms attest in a striking manner 
his sentiments of faith and piety, but his history alone 
is sufficient to show us in him a model worthy in several 
respects of our imitation. The first king of Jerusalem 
permitted himself, it is true, to fall into deplorable 
faults, he even commits great crimes, but he repairs 
them most generously; and just by his repentance, in 
bowing down under the hand of God, and in acknowl- 
edging that he was justly punished, he knew how to 
draw from his own fall a means to raise himself higher, 
and taught to all the future sinners the merit of penance 



452 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

and the value of an humble and sincere expiation. 
When one means to say that David did not merit the 
title of saint by a constantly irreproachable life, one 
has right; but the Church, which considers penance as 
a second innocence, and knows the extent of God's 
mercy as well as the frailty of man, grants the title of 
saint to the converted sinner as well as to the just who 
has never failed, to St. Paul, to St. Augustine and to 
David, as to St. Louis and to St. John; to Mary Mag- 
dalen as to St. Agnes. As to the Scripture, it calls 
David '' the man according to the heart of God " (I 
Kings xiii, 14), certainly not to approve of the faults 
which he might commit later on, but because he should 
nevertheless fulfill with fidelity the mission which Provi- 
dence had assigned to him. Scripture blames quite 
clearly the sins of the son of Isai, and we cannot behold 
in its words the eulogy of his whole conduct and the 
approbation of all his acts. The prophet Nathan 
announces to the guilty king that in punishment of his 
crime he will lose the son which Bethsabee had given to 
him and, a still harder chastisement, that his beloved son 
Absalom will revolt against him (II Kings xii, 10-12). 
God, on account of his repentance, pardons to him the 
sin committed, but the expiation thereof will be a pub- 
lic one, in order to repair the scandal (xii, 13-14). Is 
it possible to manifest in a more evident manner how 
God blames and condemns his servant when his con- 
duct is reprehensible? 

2. DAVID MERITS THE PRAISES OF SCRIPTURE. 

Moreover, in spite of his violent passions and in 
spite of the most grievous faults, David did not less 
merit the eulogies which Scripture bestows on him 



THE PROPHET DAVID. 453 

and, in imitation thereof, the entire Jewish and Chris- 
tian antiquity. God, who penetrates the hearts of men, 
beheld a vast difference between the dispositions of 
Saul and those of his successor. Both became unfaith- 
ful to Him, but whilst David returns to Him with gener- 
osity and sincerity, Saul never really repents for his 
faults, and even then when he asks pardon for them, 
it is only through egoism and self-interest. One must 
have lost all religious sense to confound Saul with 
David, and especially to place the son of Isai, as Renan 
does, below the son of Cis. Their history contains a 
characteristic feature which presents both to us in an 
analogous situation and makes to shine most brilliantly 
the difference of their dispositions. 

When Saul had violated the order of God in sparing 
Agog, King of the Amalekites, the prophet Samuel 
reproaches him in the name of the Lord for his disobedi- 
ence. When David had become guilty of adultery and 
homicide, the prophet comes to him in the name of God 
and exposes to him the horrible extent of his crimes. 
In these two circumstances, both kings answered with 
the same word: Peccavi, " I have sinned;" but this word 
had not the same meaning in their mouths. In the one 
it came from the heart, and he expressed a true and 
sincere contrition for the fault committed; in the other, 
it was only from his lips and had only one end in view, 
namely that to preserve to him his crown. David obeys 
to a movement of faith, to a supernatural motive; Saul 
has only human views and a self-interest, '' I have sin- 
ned," says Saul to Samuel, ..." but now bear, I 
beseech thee, my sin, and return with me. . . . Honor 
me now before the ancients of my people." (I Kings 
XV, 24-30.). Thus, in making his inca culpa, Saul 



454 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

thinks only about himself and his temporal inter- 
ests. 

How different are the sentiments of David! He 
only thinks about God whom he has offended, he 
humbles himself before Him: '' I have sinned against the 
Lord," he says, and adds not another word (H Kings, 
xii, 13). Whilst Saul desires to do violence to Samuel, 
and tears away a part of his cloak in order to forcibly 
retain him, David accepts without complaint the terri- 
ble chastisements which Nathan came to announce to 
him in the name of God, and he acknowledges the 
justice of the expiation to which he is going to be sub- 
jected, in saying only the sole word: '' I have sinned 
against the Lord." How can one be astonished that 
the Scripture and the religious men of all times had such 
a high idea of David and found just the reprobation of 
Saul? May they reproach, therefore, David of his 
faults and of his crimes of which he rendered himself 
guilty, in this he has been human and reprehensible; but 
let them also acknowledge his great qualities, and par- 
ticularly that spirit of religion and faith, by which he 
so nobly raised himself from his fall. 

3. ABISAG, THE CONCUBINE OF DAVID. 

The Third Book of Kings ends with the episode of 
the Sunamite Abisag selected as a concubine of David, 
when this king was already well advanced in years. 
When the Rationalists arise against this fact, what do 
they pretend to attack? Is it the fact itself or only its 
account? When they show astonishment at the author 
of Kings relating this event, we observe: i. That the 
fact related is told in sufficiently becoming terms. 2. 
That often certain persons are much more scrupulous, 



THE PROPHET DAVID. 455 

in regard to these matters, about words than about 
actions. 3. That the inspired writer had in view, in re- 
lating this account, to show in a striking manner the 
old, the exhausted condition of David. 

When, on the contrary, the Rationalists attack the 
fact itself, we answer with the Abbe Clair: " We must 
appreciate facts of this king according to the ideas of 
the time, consider that polygamy in this epoch had en- 
tered the morals in general and the kings, in particular, 
seemed to have in this respect special privileges. Then 
again, that marriage had not yet been raised to the 
dignity of a sacrament, and the condition of the woman 
was not what it became in Christian society." What 
appears shocking to us did not so appear at that time, 
and, besides, the Sacred Text cuts short to all malicious 
interpretation. 

4. DAVID AND THE PROPHECY OF NATPIAN. 

The Second Book of Kings (vii, 16) relates that 
God, in order to reward David for his faithfulness, prom- 
ised to him that his house would always exercise the 
royal authority, and that his throne would be established 
forever. This prophecy, transmitted to David by 
Nathan, was a confirmation and development of 
that of Jacob. The latter had announced that the 
scepter would not be taken away from Juda until the 
arrival of the Messiah.^ The prophet Nathan renders 
this prophecy more precise and, among all the families 
of Juda, he designates that of David to be the deposi- 
tary of the Divine promise. 

Now, the Rationalists say, this prophecy did not 
fulfill itself; the Captivity did away with the authority 

^ Gen. xlix, 10. 



45^ DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

of the family of David and since that time this house 
did not resume its power. Esdras and Nehemias were 
not of the race of David; the Machabees were priests 
and children of Levi. 

To this we answer: To interpret every prophecy we 
must examine both its spirit and letter. Thus, when 
Jacob foretells that the scepter would not be taken 
away from Juda, it would be wrong to say that this 
prophecy did not realize itself, because, from Jacob to 
David, the scepter was not in the possession of the tribe 
of Juda. So also would it be rash to pretend that the 
words usque in senipiternum, Jugitur, usque in aeternum 
contained in the prophecy of Nathan, were expressed and 
accepted by David in the sense that the scepter would 
not be taken away from the family of the Hebrew king 
as long as the world would last. Therefore, we must 
interpret the prophecies not in a literal manner, but must 
keep account of the context, of the circumstances under 
which they were made, of the spiritual state of the one 
who received them, of the vague and more or less 
obscure conditions which ordinarily accompany a pre- 
diction, as long as the event has not come to clear it 
up and confirm it. 

M^hen we keep account of these rules, we will remark 
that nothing, in the prophecy of Nathan, authorizes 
to maintain that the royal power should never be 
eclipsed in the house of David. What the prophecy of 
Jacob had announced was the preeminence of Juda 
until the epoch of the Messiah; this prophecy fulfilled 
itself, because, even during the Babylonian Captivity, 
the tribe of Juda existed as a nation; the same was the 
case when it returned to retake possession of Palestine, 
whilst the other tribes always remained dispersed. 



THE PROPHET DAVID. 457 

As to the particulars which the prophecy of Nathan 
added to that of Jacob, they can be summed up as fol- 
lows: \Miatever the events may have been, the race of 
David, for a long time, master of Juda. will again be 
the dominating power in the epoch of the Messiah. 
Now, this prophecy was fulfilled and even in a fuller 
manner than David could expect: his house effectively 
exercised the royal power over Juda; when afterwards 
there were eclipses, the race of David was always 
known as the one that had the right to the throne, 
always as the royal race, and when the Messiah came to 
found his kingdom, real kingdom, although not of this 
world, it was found that the Savior was of the race of 
David. Thus in the epoch of David, the house of 
David holds the scepter: in the epoch fixed for its ful- 
fillment, it is again the house of David that holds the 
scepter, in the person of Jesus Christ and. finally, since 
the prophecy was made until the epoch of its fulfillment, 
it is always the family of David that is the royal family. 
For. although it does not in reality hold the scepter, 
we can always distinguish and recognize it as the one 
that should hold it. \Miat more can one require? But 
there is more. 

Nathan gave the promise to the family of David that 
it should reign iisqiie in actermivi. Very well. This 
prophecy fulfills itself continually in a literal manner: the 
centuries wdiich separate David from the end of the 
world behold the reign, at first temporal, then spiritual, 
of his oft'sDrino^s: and from that time, in such a long- 
series of years, the eclipse about which the Rationalists 
speak has only the value of a moment and proves 
nothing against the fulfillment of the promises made to 
David.' 



CHAPTER XLIV. 



THE PR OP HE T IS A IAS. 
I. THE AUTHENTICITY OF ISAIAS. 

THE greatest of the prophets is Isaias. Of the col- 
lection of his oracles, divided into two parts, the 
most beautiful and the most important is the second, 
which comprises the last twenty-seven chapters. All 
the RationaHstic writers deny its authenticity. They 
suppose that the chapters forty to sixty-six of this 
prophet date from the Babylonian Captivity. A great 
number of Protestant theologians have followed in 
their footsteps. Since the time when supernatural 
prophecy became rejected, with the miracle, as an im- 
possibility, it also became necessary to condemn writ- 
ings wherein revelation is evident in the fact that they 
contained predictions. Hence, in reality, it is in order 
to deny the supernatural that the infidel critics deny 
the authenticity of the second part of Isaias. Several 
vehemently assert that Isaias could not have written 
the prophecies with regard to the Babylonian Captivity, 
because he lived during the Assyrian period, when the 
king of Ninive exercised the supremacy in Minor 
Asia, and, because Babylonia formed a part of this 
empire. It has been remarked with good judgment 
that, following this rule, the composition of the chap- 
ters fift3^-two and fifty-five of Isaias could be carried 
(458) 



THE PROPHET ISAIAS. 459 

on to the Christian era, and that it might be main- 
tained that the one who has written them has read the 
Epistles of St. Paul. The negation of the prophetic 
revelation entails the negation of the authenticity of 
all the prophets of the Old Testament: Osee could not 
foretell the ruin of the kingdom of Israel and the 
return from the Captivity; Michaeus, the ruin of 
Samaria and of Jerusalem, the Babylonian Captivity 
and the birth of the Messiah at Bethlehem; Nahum, 
the destruction of Ninive and Habacuk, that of the 
Chaldeans. Nobody, however, dares to deny the 
authenticity of these prophecies. Besides, the Rational- 
ists feel that the rejection a priori of prophecy is 
logically weak, so they all endeavor to discover positive 
proofs in favor of their conclusions. 

2. The first argument they bring up in order to 
establish that Isaias is not the author of the prophecies 
concerning the Captivity, is the historic situation 
which they'suppose. In other words, they find fault 
with the time given by the prophet, and hence deny 
the authenticity of the second part of Isaias, because the 
author speaks therein of the Captivity, not as of a 
future event, but as of a present fact, and because he 
describes it as if he were in Babylonia, not in Palestine. 

To this we answer, in the first place, it is certain 
that Isaias lives in spirit in the midst of the captives, 
and it is thereby that he is a prophet, God unveiling 
to him the future. All, both Rationalists and faithful 
critics, must acknowledge that what characterizes the 
style of the prophets is that they cross the limits of 
time and to behold as if actually present. But since it 
is thus that the prophet Isaias speaks in many places 
^s if he had lived in the midst of the captives, it does not 



460 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

follow at all that he did not prophesy before Nabuch- 
odonsor. 

However, it is true that the epoch in which the 
writer lived must manifest itself always by some 
features, for he writes for his contemporaries as well 
as for posterity. Also, we will prove against the 
Rationalists: (i) That he lived before the Captivity; 
(2) That the author of the second part of Isaias did live 
in Palestine. 

In the first place he lived before the Babylonian 
Captivity. As it is " the servant of Jehovah," and not 
the prophet that speaks almost constantly in this part 
of Isaias, it is more easy for him to abstract himself in 
some way from his time and surroundings; however, 
the chronological indications are not wanting. And 
first the author speaks as prophet, like a man who writes 
a long time before the events which he announces (Is. 
xli, 21-29; x^iii» 9y xlv, 21 ; xli, 9; xlviii, 5-16). ''Who," 
he says among other things, ''hath foretold these events 
beforehand? . . . It is I who have announced to' 
you (the future). ... I have announced to thee 
the future before the time. I have made it known to 
thee before it arrives. Assemble yourselves together, 
all you, and hear: who among them had declared these 
things? . . . Come ye near unto me and hear this: 
I have not spoken in secret from the beginning, from 
the time before it was done, I was there " (Is. xlv, 21; 
xlii, 12; xlviii, 5, 14, 16). 

The great event which God had thus prophesied, 
is the deliverance of Israel by Cyrus. Now, if these 
words had been written only when the King of Persia 
had actually restored the liberty to the captives, how 
could the prophet have expressed himself thus by 



THE PROPHET ISAIAS. 46 1 

addressing himself to the captives themselves? These 
words suppose that the prophecies are known before 
hand, and consequently that they have been written 
before the events. They also throw the Rationalists 
into a great perplexity, and prevent them from agreeing 
among themselves as to the date of the second part of 
Isaias. 

One cannot, therefore, deny that the author speaks 
of Cyrus as a prophet. How long before? "About 
twenty years,'' answers one of the infidel critics. We 
will show, by pursuing our inquiries, that these prophe- 
cies were made a good deal earlier. The fact established 
that the second part of Isaias is anterior to the events 
which it announces, because these events were foretold 
before they had occurred, we have not estabhshed how 
long w^as the time between the foretelling and the 
execution. Is it permissible to proceed farther and fix 
not a precise date, because the intrinsic examination of 
such a writing does not allow this, but an approximate 
epoch? Yes it is, and we are equipped also to establish 
that the writer composed his work before the Captivity. 
Indeed, he reproaches God's people for their idolatry, 
as a crime actually committed. These reproaches are 
renewed in a multitude of passages, he returns to them 
continually, with a persistency and vehemence which 
attest that idolatry was the curse of his time. 

Now, the acts of idolatry of which the prophet 
reproaches the people of God could have taken place 
only before the Captivity? The Rationalists maintain, 
as they are obliged to do for their thesis, that the 
crimes with which the Jew^s are accused were committed 
in Chaldea, where they adored the local gods. This 
assertion is certainly false, as Juda is accused of violat- 



462 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

ing the law by dwelling in tombs (Is. Ixviii, 4), and by 
offering sacrifices to idols " on high mountains/' har 
gdbaoh, all of which could not have occurred in Chaldea, 
where there are no mountains, nor tombs hewed out of 
rock, which might be used for habitations. Idolatrous 
worship was, consequently, rendered to the Canaanitish 
gods before the Captivity. The Captivity was the 
chastisement of their idolatry; consequently, these ora- 
cles were written before the Captivity, as were those of 
the first part of Isaias where the language is similar. If 
idolatry had been continued at Babylonia as in Judea, 
God could not have considered the captives repentant 
and would not reopen to them the gates of their 
country. 

Moreover, the author of the second part of Isaias 
does not speak of the last years of the kingdom of 
Juda. This silence would be inexplicable, if these 
oracles had dated from the time of the Captivity, for 
what rich material would there not have been furnished 
to his eloquence derived from the chastisements inflicted 
upon Juda, because of its idolatry and its infidelity, by 
the arms of Nabuchodonosor! But God has not re- 
vealed these details to his prophet. He knows only of 
the impious worship rendered to the false gods at the 
time of Manasse, King of Juda. Here is his horizon. 
The nations which he knows best are not those who 
are the neighbors of Babylonia, but those with whom a 
resident of Jerusalem would be the most familiar in the 
epoch of Ezechias and Manasse, viz: the Egyptians, 
the Ethiopians, the Idumeans, the Madianites. 

3. The intrinsic examination of the second part of 
Isaias leads us, therefore, in regard to its date, to the 
conclusions of tradition. The same holds good in 



THE PROPHET ISAIAS. 463 

regard to the place where it must have been composed. 
When it really emanated h'om the first of the great 
prophets it could have been written only in Palestine, in 
the kingdom of Juda, because Isaias always lived in this 
country. According to the Rationalists, it was formu- 
lated in Chaldea, but this assertion is in contradiction 
with the language of the prophet. Indeed, he expresses 
himself in many places as only an inhabitant of the Holy 
Land could do, and what gives to this proof a particular 
value is, that the writer reveals to us unconsciously, 
through allusions to which he does not pay attention 
himself, the place in which he writes. 

Not only does the prophet express himself as a 
man living in the country of Juda, but he speaks as an 
inhabitant of Jerusalem, such as Isaias was. He 
addresses himself to Sion and to Jerusalem, he tells that 
God places guards over the walls of this city (Is. Ixii, i, 
16; xlii, 9); he speaks as living in the midst of it and, 
consequently, supposes that this capital of Juda is not 
ruined and destroyed (xl, 2, 9; Ivi, 5, 7). 

Whilst certain passages show that the author lives 
in Palestine, others prove that he does not write in 
Chaldea. Mentioning in one place (xli, 8-9), the voca- 
tion of x\braham, he says that God called him "from the 
extremities of the earth." One could express himself 
thus only in Jerusalem, where Chaldea, the country of 
Abraham, was considered as situated at the end of the 
world, but one could not speak in this manner at Baby- 
lonia and in Chaldea itself, where these expressions would 
not have had any meaning. The prophet also indicates to 
us very clearly that he is far from the shores of the Eu- 
phrates when he says in addressing himself to the Jews: 
''Depart, depart, go ye out from thence" (lii, 11). 



464 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Had he been in these places he would have said neces- 
sarily: "Depart from here!' In the same passage he em- 
ploys, indeed, the expression ''here" (lii, 5) to designate 
the dwelling of God, the Temple of Jerusalem: "And 
now what have I here, said the Lord, for my people are 
taken away gratis." Finally, the allusions to Chaldea 
and to Babylonia are few and indefinite, as is natural 
for a writer who never saw this country. 

4. The second of the more important accusations 
which have been brought against the authenticity of 
the second part of Isaias is derived from the style. 
But inasmuch as the Rationalists themselves are not 
agreed as to the real value of this argument, it certainly 
is not worthy of a place. 

All the efforts of infidelity to rob Isaias of the 
greatest ornaments of his prophetic crown are therefore 
vain and futile. From all we come to tell we have suffi- 
ciently established that Isaias lived long before the 
Bab3donish Captivity, and that he lived in Palestine 
and was an inhabitant of Jerusalem. 



CHAPTER XLV. 



THE PROPHETS JEREMIAS AND BARUCH. 
I. THE PROPHECY AGAINST BABYLON. 

THE prophecies of Jeremias have such a character of 
authenticity that they are universally accepted as 
the work of this prophet. But few critics assert that 
some other than Jeremias formulated his prophecies, 
except in the case of the prophecy he makes against 
Babylonia, which is considered unauthentic merely be- 
cause he has the wrong, in the eyes of the infidels, to 
be too visibly prophetic. According to certain Ration- 
alists this prediction was written about the end of the 
Captivity by a more recent writer, and fraudulently 
intercalated in the collection of the works of Jeremias. 
According to others, Jeremias was truly the author of 
it, but others have added to it and made many altera- 
tions. 

'' The author lived evidently in Babylonia," says 
Kuenen, " about the second half of the exile, in the 
epoch when Cyrus already gained great victories, and 
when he prepared himself for the decisive conquest of 
Chaldea. We do not need to state that this author 
could not have been Jeremias." Reuss is so convinced 
that the prophecy against Babylonia cannot have its 
origin from Jeremias that he has eliminated It from the 
book which contains the oracles of this prophet, and has 
placed it in a different volume of his translation of the 
Bible, as the work of an anonymous writer, who wrote 
" about the end of the exile." The principal reason 
D. B.— 30 (465) 



466 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

which he gives in favor of his opinion is that Jeremias 
gave the prophecy to a person who went to Babylon to 
read it to the people, and then to tie a stone to it and 
throw it into the Euphrates, saying: " Behold how 
Babylonia shall be destroyed." " Besides this," says 
Reuss, '' this prophecy is not according to the spirit of 
the time." 

Why not according to the spirit of the time? The 
prophet should have promulgated his prophecy so 
solemnly and accompanied this promulgation by a pro- 
phetic action, in order that his prediction should be re- 
garded as not in accordance with this spirit of time. 
He commanded that the manuscript containing it 
should be thrown into the Euphrates only with the 
object of attracting more attention, and for the purpose 
of engraving deeply on the minds of the captives the 
momentous prediction he had made. And, besides, was 
there anything to prevent the prophet and the other 
Jews from making a copy of the manuscript before it 
was consigned to the waters? And if so, could it not 
have been read in Babylonia in the same form as we 
read it to-day? 

As to the contradictions which it is claimed exist 
between this prophecy and other oracles of Jeremias, 
they are imaginary. Jeremias had foretold that the 
Captivity would last seventy years (Jer. xxv, 12). The 
final prophecy is only the development and the comple- 
ment of the first oracle. This is also a'dmitted by several 
Rationalists. 

2. LETTER OF JEREMIAS TO THE JEWS IN CAPTIVITY. 

At the end of the Lamentations of Jeremias in the 
Greek version of the Septuagint, after the conclusion 



THE PROPHETS JEREMIAS AND BARUCH. 467 

of the prophecy of Banich in the Vulgate (Bar. vi), is 
placed a letter of Jeremias, the Hebrew original of which 
is lost. It is addressed to the Jews led away captives 
to Babylonia by Nabuchodonosor ; it has for its object 
to warn them against the dangers of idolatry to which 
they were exposed in Chaldea, by proving to them that 
the idols are no real gods. According to the Rational- 
ists, this letter is not from Jeremias. In the first place 
according to them, it is not his, '' because if such were 
the case, we would have to suppose a Hebrew original ; 
now, it is certain that if any of the apocryphal writings 
have been composed in Greek, it was this letter. The 
author of this writing must be a Hellenist Jew, living 
after Alexander the Great. 

This affirmation is not founded. The letter of 
Jeremias, in spite of brevity, contains comparatively 
numerous Hebraisms and singular phrases, which can- 
not be explained except through a Hebrew original : 
it is thus that the author frequently employs the future 
instead of the present, according to the Hebrew cus- 
tom, etc. 

The second objection against the authenticity of 
the letter of Jeremias, is a pretended contradiction be- 
tween this writing and certain prophecies of the priest 
of Anatoth. It is well known that the latter had 
announced that the Babylonian Captivity should last 
seventy years ; now the author of the letter says that it 
will last as long '' as seven generations " (Bar.vi,2), that 
is, more than two hundred years, because it is calculated 
that each generation is equal on an average to a dura- 
tion of thirty years. Thus the same prophet could not 
have contradicted himself in this manner, and the one 
who assigns such a considerable length of time to the 



468 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Captivity cannot be the same as the one who Hmits it 
to seventy years. 

This reasoning would be conclusive if it were estab- 
lished that the word dor, which was certainly here the 
original word, expressed in Hebrew a determined time, 
as does the word genea or generation in Greek, and 
m the history of Herodotus (ii, 142). D6r signifies 
an indefinite time; the number ''seven" is also employed 
in an indefinite manner, so that the expression '' seven 
generations " signifies more or less time. Besides we 
have to remark that Jeremias alone could express him- 
self thus in this letter, for the duration of seventy years 
of the Captivity was so well known that a forger, writ- 
ing after the event, would not have failed to be precise 
in this passage. 

Besides, the Assyro-Chaldaic archaeology confirms 
in the most striking manner the letter of Jeremias. 

3. BARUCH. 

The prophecy of Baruch has come down to us only 
in Greek. It is considered by the majority of Protes- 
tants as apocryphal. But the objections against it are 
absolutely without foundation. The first, is that it 
was, they say, written originally in Greek, and therefore 
long after the time of Baruch. This objection is so 
evidently false that certain Rationalists admit that only 
the first three chapters were written originally in He- 
brew, while others maintain the entire book was so 
written. Origen was acquainted with the original 
Semitic text. Theodotion translated the same. Until 
the Greek version of the Septuagint the Semitic idioms 
are so clearly recognizable that the Rationalist David- 



THE PROPHETS JEREMIAS AND BARUCH. 469 

son justly ridiculed the vain attempt to deny it. The 
phraseology is Hebraic and not Greek, the different 
phrases being united among one another simply by the 
conjunction '' and." Very many terms are plainly not 
of Greek origin. " We beg mercy in Thy sight, O Lord 
our God " (Baruch, ii, 19) is a Hebrew idiom. In several 
places we read " to make " instead of " to serve " the 
false gods or the Babylonian king, because addd signifies 
both to make and to serve (Bar. i, 22; ii, 21, 22, 24). 
Again the translator speaks of the " sackcloth of afflic- 
tion," that is, the garment they wore as a sign of afflic- 
tion. The word e7iut which is translated by deesis^ as in 
the Psalms, certainly signifies affliction (Bar. iv, 20). 
" The merchants of Merrha," mean the '' merchants of 
Madian," because the translator took a d for an r, on 
account of the resemblance of these two letters in 
Hebrew writing. 

The second objection against the authenticity of 
the Book of Baruch is derived from the following 
sources. It is related therein that the prophet went to 
Babylonia five years after the ruin of Jerusalem, and that 
he read his prophecies in the presence of Jechonias, 
King of Juda. It is maintained that these details can- 
not be historical. Nothing, however, is offered to show 
that they are false; moreover, their truthfulness is evi- 
dent from the fact that many who deny the authenticity 
of Baruch refuse to accept this argument. Baruch, who 
was the secretary of Jeremias, followed his master into 
Egypt, in the first or second year after the destruction 
of the Temple. Three or four years after this he went 
to Babylonia in order that he might console and exhort 
the captives. While there nothing prevented him 
from reading his prophecies to Jechonias, who was not 



470 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

confined as prisoners are with us, but who enjoyed a 
comparative Hberty. 

An incontestable proof, Rationalists declare, that 
the Book of Baruch is not genuine is found in the fact 
that the prophet names Joakim as the Jewish high 
priest, in the fifth year after the destruction of Jerusalem 
(Bar. i, 8). Now, some say '' in the fifth year after the 
destruction of Jerusalem " Josedek was the high priest, 
according to others it was Saraias. — Whether it was 
Josedek or Saraias, matters very little. The actual 
text does not say Joakim was high priest, it merely men- 
tions he was a priest. The reason he is particularly 
spoken of is because he was a more important person 
than the others, but from this fact it does not follow that 
he enjoyed the honors of the high priesthood. At the 
time of the destruction of Juda's capital the high priest 
was Seraias, who was slain at Reblatha (Jer. Hi, 24-27). 
His son Josedek, who would have succeeded him, was 
carried ofT to Babylonia (Par. v, 41 ; Vulg. vi, 1 5). Hence, 
the captives could not send assistance to Josedek at 
Jerusalem, but they could easily have sent aid, as the 
text implies, to Joakim, who was, according to his own 
genealogy, a near relative of Josedek, who had undoubt- 
edly replaced him as high priest at the capital (Cf. Bar. 
i, 7, with Par. vi, 13; v, 39). 

It is further objected against the authenticity of 
the Book of Baruch two historical inaccuracies which 
is said it contains, namely, that the Jews offered at 
Jerusalem, at the time their prophet wrote, *' sacrifices 
on the altar of the Lord " (Bar. i, 10), and that they 
read his prophecies " on the feast days, in the house of 
the Lord." At this date, they assure us, there was 
neither altar nor house of the Lord. Hence, only a 



THE PROPHET JEREMIAS AND BARUCH. 47 1 

falsifier could have imagined such an anachronism. 
As to the first point, we can grant that the altar of the 
true God was destroyed at the time of the destruction 
of the Temple, by the troops of King Nabuchodonosor, 
because their destruction although not mentioned is 
at least very probable, but we can hardly doubt but that 
the priests rebuilt the altar in order to offer to God the 
sacrifice of the law. In fact, nothing was easier, for 
we must not forget that the sacrifices were publicly 
offered in an open space, or yard, so that it would not 
require much labor to restore, at least, the altar of 
holocausts. — Since the victims were regularly immolated 
in honor of the true God, and this fact answers suffi- 
ciently the second objection, the Jews naturally assem- 
bled in the parvis of the Temple, as they were formerly 
accustomed to do, and where they could listen to the 
book, sent to them from Babylonia, being read to them. 
This place of reunion is called ''the house" or "temple 
of the Lord," as our Vulgate translates, because this 
was the name they had been accustomed to give 
to that part of Mount Moriah where Solomon had 
built the Temple. But from this expression it does 
not follow that the building which the people of 
Israel called the '' Temple of the Lord " was still erect. 
The proof that these words are to be taken in a broad 
sense is, that the public ceremonies were never per- 
formed in the Temple itself; there neither could any- 
thing be read to the people, as the people never entered 
it. The reading of the prophecies could only be held 
in the outside enclosure, which was also called " Tem- 
ple," and by way of latitude of expression " Temple of 
the Lord," since it was here the victims were immolated 
to the Lord. These enclosures always existed, and, 



472 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

therefore, the people could assemble there just as they 
did before the destruction of the Temple proper by 
Nabuchodonosor. We have besides this, a formal proof 
of the oblation of victims about this time by the 
prophet Jeremias, who employs the same expression as 
Baruch. He relates that after the destruction of the 
Temple, twenty-four men from Sichem, Silo and Sam- 
aria came to Jerusalem, bringing gifts and incense '^ to 
offer them in the Temple to the Lord " (Jer. xl, 5; see 
also I Esd. ii, 68; iii, 2, 3, 6). This passage is conclusive. 
None of the objections, therefore, against the book of 
Baruch, gives us any fair grounds to question its authen- 
ticity. 



CHAPTER XLVI. 



THE PROPHECIES OF EZECHIEL AND THE VISION 
OF THE CHERUBIM. 

^•nPHE authenticity of the prophecies of Ezechiel has 
1 never been seriously called into doubt. To con- 
test them to-day is more impossible than ever: the 
modern discoveries in Assyria form the most eloquent 
commentary of this prophetic book, and proclaim both 
its incontestable authenticity and veracity. 

2. The Rationalists, however, formulate not only 
objections of detail against the oracles of Ezechiel, but 
the infidels of the last century have often belittled him, 
and their sarcasms against this prophet are so well 
known that it is necessary to say a few words about 
them. Tindal considered inacceptable a portion of the 



THE PROPHECIES OF EZECHIEL. 473 

accounts contained in the book of this prophet, because 
they contain commands unworthy of God or of an im- 
possible execution, such as, for example, the order to 
draw Jerusalem on tablets of clay to depict its seige. A 
brick recovered at Babylon and representing the plan 
of this city, crossed by the Euphrates, has shown that 
the fact was not only possible, but quite conformable to 
the customs of Chaldea. 

The jokes of the same English infidel, elaborated 
by Voltaire, one that they have called the breakfast of 
Ezechiel (iv, 9-15), in order to show that the command- 
ment given to the prophet was unworthy of the deity, 
are in bad form and manifest a great ignorance of the 
customs of the Orient. When God prescribed to His 
prophet to make use of dried human excrement for pur- 
pose of fuel, in order to mark the extreme scarcity to 
which one will be reduced, and when, on account of the 
repugnance Ezechiel displays, he is permitted to substi- 
tute for this animal excrement, this conduct of God 
may surprise us, but does not astonish at all the Orientals 
who are in the habit to prepare every day their bread 
with this combustible. In Egypt, in the neighborhood 
of Cairo, at Hubbah, and in Cairo itself, the Abbe 
Vigouroux relates that he saw women kneading cow 
dung with a little earth and straw, into the form of 
round cakes, to be used in place of wood fuel which is 
very scarce. Also at Nazareth, he saw women knead- 
ing cow dung for the same purpose, and an oven heated 
to bake therein the bread with the same fuel. Nothing 
is more common than this usage in a great part of Asia. 
In India it has even a kind of sacred character. The 
local customs explain, therefore, quite naturally the 
" breakfast of Ezechiel," 



474 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

3. They have sought also to turn into ridicule the 
order given to Ezechiel to eat a book (iv, 4-6), to sleep 
three hundred and ninety days on the left side and forty 
days on the right side (xii, 3-7), to remove all the furni- 
ture from the house during the day and leave it himself 
in the evening through a hole pierced in the wall; but 
these are all symbols and prophecies of action, destined 
to strike more strongly than simple words the imagina- 
tion of the people. Besides, nothing obliges us to 
accept them in the Hteral sense, particularly the eating 
of the book. Many commentators are of the opinion 
that all this took place only in vision. " Ezechiel," 
says Kuenen, " has often recourse to tableaux or to 
symbolic acts, which are ordinarily in relation with the 
prophetic visions. These symbolic acts are for the 
most of such a nature that the prophet can hardly be 
believed to have accompUshed them." The Catholic 
interpreters do not believe different. 

4. THE CHERUBIM OF EZECHIEL. 

The vision of the Cherubim is one of the most cele- 
brated in the Book of Ezechiel on account of its mystery 
and magnificence. Summarized, Ezechiel sees four 
animals with human countenances, each having four 
forms and four wings; their feet were those of a bull, 
their hands those of a man; their form, in front, was that 
of a man, at the right that of a lion, at the left that of a 
bull, and finally the wings gave them a fourth form, 
that of an eagle (Ez. I). In a second vision of these 
same beings, the prophet learned that they were Cheru- 
l)im (20). 

What could this strange vision mean? The image 
of the Cherubim carrying the throne of God was already 



THE PROPHECIES OF EZECHIEL. 475 

a known figure and indicated the dominion of God 
over the most perfect beings. Such as the angels; but 
why did Ezechiel, employing this figure, give to the 
Cherubim such a mysterious, such an imaginable form? 
Both the Jewish and Christian interpreters, until lately, 
saw always therein an enigma the solution of which 
would probably never be arrived at. For the infidels 
this vision was not, as Ezechiel affirmed, a divine man- 
ifestation, but a product of fanatical imagination of the 
prophet; this alone could have conceived these '' fright- 
ful Cherubim," with their stern features. Very well! 
there is no passage in the whole Bible which has been 
so wonderfully verified by the Assyriological dis- 
coveries, and to-day, although there remains still some 
obscurities, the key of the enigma has been found. 

Ezechiel prophesied in the midst of the Jews captive 
at Babylon; now, among all the things which must have 
affected the imagination of the Jews transported into 
a country so different from their own, the most inclined 
to astonish them was the sight of those colossal idols, 
representing Hons or winged bulls, specimens of which 
have been recovered in our days and may be seen in 
several European museums. The impression which 
these monsters, with an animal body and the head of 
a man make upon us is at first one of surprise, then of 
admiration; for they are equally remarkable by their 
dimensions, their imposing and grandiose aspect, the 
composition of the figure and the beauty of the work. 
But when we represent to ourselves twenty or more 
statues standing in a line in the midst of a city, the peo- 
ple of which venerated them, and to whom they attrib- 
uted their victories, one will conceive the feeling the 
Jews must have experienced in beholding them. They 



4/6 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

must have made an immense impression upon the 
people, that was so much incHned to idolatry, and which 
found itself now captive among the adorers of these 
idols. They must have been tempted to believe the 
Chaldeans far above themselves, and the reUgion which 
had such a splendor could appear to them less despis- 
able than they had imagined. Hence, it would not have 
been a difficult matter for them to have fallen into 
idolatry. But God resolved to put the Jews on their 
guard against this temptation: also, wishing to show 
to Ezechiel the Cherubim supporting the firmament 
which serves as His throne. He represented these angels, 
incorporeal by their nature, under the form of those mys- 
terious beings which affected so greatly the imagination 
oi the Jews, in order to show to them that these Chal- 
dean gods were insignificant when compared with Him. 
Hence, there were two images united in the vision o£ 
Ezechiel : God carried upon the wings of the angels, 
and God crushing with His foot the Chaldean idols ; 
both were well understood by the Jews, so much the 
more as the name of these winged beings was the same 
in whatever light one considered them: angels were 
Cherubim; idols also were Cherubim, for the Chaldeans 
called their winged bulls kerube. 

The comparative and deeper study of the Biblical 
text and the Chaldean statues, shows that the system 
exposed above is not a singular hypothesis, but an incon- 
testable reality. Both the Biblical and Chaldean Cheru- 
bim have features of human form upon an animal 
body, with the wings of an eagle. Undoubtedly, one 
can point out some differences, the principal of which is 
that each cherub of Ezechiel has the form of a bull and of 
a lion, whilst the Chaldean idols represented either bulls 



THE PROPHET DANIEL. 477 

(kerube) or lions (nirgalli), and did not unite these two 
forms in the same individual; but, in summary, it is 
impossible in future not to see in the Chaldean kerube 
the reason for the strange form under which was man- 
ifested to the prophet the Cherubim who carried His 
throne; it is equally impossible to pretend that the 
Book of Ezechiel has been composed elsewhere than in 
Chaldea, in an epoch other than that of the splendor of 
Babvlon, 



CHAPTER XLVn. 



THE PROPHET DANIEL, • 

THE Rationalists are in accord in rejecting the 
authenticity of the Book of Daniel. It contains 
very circumstantial predictions, hence it can have been 
composed, say the infidel critics, only post eventum^ 
i. e., after the events of which it speaks had been ful- 
filled. The author of Daniel is inaccurately informed 
as to the events of the epoch in which the personage of 
this name lived; hence the Book is posterior to Daniel. 
On the one hand, the author is perfectly acquainted 
with the events which signalize the beginning of the war 
of independence under the Machabees, therefore, he 
must have lived in this epoch. This is the sort of 
reasoning of the infidels: prophecy is impossible, conse- 
quently, the so-called predictions which announce his- 
toric facts have been written only when the facts had 
already been fulfilled. Such is the argumentation of 
the Rationalists. 



478 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

We acknowledge that Daniel knew very well the his- 
tory of the Machabees, because God had revealed it to 
him, but we affirm that he did not less accurately know" 
and describe the history of his time, that of Nabucho- 
donosor, and the fall of Babylon under the blows of 
Cyrus. Providence, to verify his prophet, has permit- 
ted the Assyriologic researches during late years, to 
resucitate a long buried past, in order to show to all the 
exactitude of the oracles contained in the Book of 
Daniel. Thanks to the Assyrio-Chaldaic discoveries, 
we can prove now that the pretended errors of this 
prophet were only the errors of his critics. To-day 
ignorance alone can make this reproach of a lack of 
historic truth. The negative criticism had the pre- 
sumption to speak as the sole exponent of science, yet 
its own followers who make the science of the Scrip- 
tures a specialty, were ignorant of the modern dis- 
coveries, which confirm the veracity of Daniel in such 
a striking manner! Even the Assyriologues imbued 
with Rationalism, are careful to repeat the objections 
which the others never tire of repeating, while those 
who do not deny the supernatural render homage to 
the exactitude of the descriptions of the prophet. 

2. The first difficulty the objectors raise against the 
account of Daniel is drawn from the history of the Jews. 
Namely, Daniel reports (i, 1-4), thiit in the third year 
of the reign of Joakim, Nabuchodonosor took Jerusa- 
lem, a part of the sacred vessels of the Temple, and led 
away to Babylon as captives some of the most consider- 
able persons of the capital. 

'' Nothing of the kind took place under the reign 
of Joakim," say the Rationalists. Behold a very extra- 
ordinary affirmation. Without speaking of the formal 



THE PROPHET DANIEL. 479 

testimony of the Paralipomenons, which have quite 
another weight than that of the negative criticism, 
we open the Books of Kings and read there: " In his 
days Nabuchodonosor, King of Babylon, came up, and 
Joakim became its servant three years, then again he 
rebelled against him. And the Lord sent against him 
the rovers of the Chaldeans and the rovers of Syria, and 
the rovers of Moab, and the rovers of the children of 
xAmmon " (IV Kings, xxiv, 1-2), Nabuchodonosor 
made, therefore, war upon Joakim. About this war 
the Books of Paralipomenons give us more details than 
does the Book of Kings, but what we read in the text 
quoted is sufficient to explain what the Book of Daniel 
reports, for the kings of this epoch never made war, 
and never imposed any tribute without carrying off 
precious vessels and captives. All the cuneiform in- 
scriptions attest to this, and to deny it would be deny- 
ing the daylight. 

But, they say, '' we know from the Book of Jeremias 
that nothing of the kind has transpired under the reign 
of Joakim." This affirmation is not less false than the 
foregoing one. Jeremias expressly foretells the cam- 
paign of Nabuchodonosor, in which Daniel was led 
away captive; the most of the commentators are agreed 
in acknowledging this, and they accept with assurance 
a first transportation in this epoch, because it is at this 
date (606 B. C.) that the seventy years of the Babylon- 
ian Captivity begin, the prediction of which had become 
particularly famous among the. prophet's contempo- 
raries. 

But how can we admit, continue the Rationalists, that 
Daniel and his three friends were received into the body 
of the Babylonian wisemen? Could they really have had 



48o DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

access to their ranks? Yes, undoubtedly. We must 
not imagine that the Chaldeans had the same ideas and 
the same customs as ourselves. They were in the habit 
of providing themselves with slaves from the different 
nations, and when the captive children had been raised 
after the Babylonian fashion, they were regarded as 
Chaldeans. Besides, the kings needed to keep about 
them officers that had been born in the countries of 
which the Chaldeans had rendered themselves masters. 
This fact is attested by the cuneiform inscriptions. In 
one of them Sennacherib incidentally relates that a 
young Chaldean, named Belibni, had received a Chal- 
daic education in the palace at Ninive under the 
auspices of Sargon, and was afterwards placed by him 
on the throne of Babylon (Sennacherib, '' Cylinder of 
Bellino," line 13; G. Smith, '' History of Sennacherib," 
p. 27). 

3. Another objection: During an idolatrous festival, 
related by Daniel, we find the enumeration of a certain 
number of musical instruments. Some of them bear 
Greek names. From this fact the Rationalists conclude 
that the book wherein we read these Greek words could 
have been written only under the Macedonian domi- 
nation, a long time after the epoch of Daniel. 

To explain how the Greek words find themselves 
in Daniel, it is well to remember, in the first place, that 
these instruments were known in Minor Asia since the 
epoch of Nabuchodonosor. The Assyrians and Chal- 
deans had a very pronounced taste for music; musicians 
are frequently represented on their monuments. On 
bas-reliefs we behold instruments of which Daniel 
speaks. Hence, there is no anachronism in his account 
as to those things.- Is there in the words? Certainly 



THE PROPHET DANIEL. 48 1 

one cannot prove this. To establish it one would have 
to be able to show that the Assyrio-Chaldeans had no 
relations with the Greeks, neither directly nor in- 
directly. The Phenicians were at first tributaries to 
the Assyrian kings, later to Nabuchodonosor. This 
commercial people spread through Asia the products 
of the Greeks, musical instruments, perfected by the 
Hellenists, who. were great lovers of harmony. And, 
as it always happens in the importation of merchandises, 
the foreign name is introduced with the object itself, so 
the instrument kept its Greek name at the court of 
Nabuchodonosor. 

4. The miracle which took place on the occasion of 
the festival in favor of the companions of Daniel, and 
an analogous miracle which later on saved the prophet 
in the lion's den, furnish other objections. To follow 
the infidels we have to believe that, according to the 
third and sixth chapter of Daniel, Nabuchodonosor and 
Darius had acknowledged without reserve, the absolute 
sovereignty of the God of Israel. 

These two kings had not " acknowledged without 
reserve the absolute sovereignty of the God of Israel;" 
they had not abjured polytheism and their own religion; 
they had confessed only the power of Jehovah, the 
God of Israel, which in their thought reconciled itself 
easily with the religious beliefs, because according to 
these beliefs, each nation had its own god real and true. 
Nabuchodonosor in the proclamation to his people, 
makes express profession of paganism: he speaks of 
Daniel, who is called in the Chaldaic language Baltassar 
*' after the name of my God "^ (Bel), says he, " and 
three times he speaks expressly of the gods " (iv, 5, 

1 Dan. iv, 5. 

D. B.-3r 



482 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

6, 15). As to Darius praising the God of Israel, he did 
what Cyrus himself did with regard to the Babylonian 
deities as is attested by the inscriptions of this prince 
recently discovered. " In the work of the reparation of 
the sanctuary of Marduk, the great god, I occupied 
myself. To me (Cyrus) the king, his adorer, and to 
Cambyses, my son, the offspring from my heart, and to 
my faithful army (Marduk) granted graciously his favor. 
. . . And every day I prayed to Bel and Nebo, in 
order to prolong my days and increase my prosperity, 
and repeated to Marduk, my god, that adorer Cyrus, 
the king and his son Cambyses. . . ." (H. Rawlin- 
son, " Clay Cylinder of Cyrus the Great," in the Jour- 
nal of the Asiatic Society, 1880, p. 89.) 

The conclusion to the above is wanting, but the pas- 
sage proves sufficiently that when Cyrus, adorer of 
Ahurmazda, spoke in these terms of Marduk (Mero- 
doch) and of Nebo, Darius could well speak as he did 
of the true God as related in the Book of Daniel. 

5. As to the difficulties raised against the statue 
erected by Nabuchodonosor, they are also refuted by 
Assyriology. '' That which we have to point out," 
says Menant, " with regard to the subject of this 
episode, is the erection of a colossal statue of gold in 
the plain of Babylon. Not only has this fact nothing 
of the impossible, but it has its reality. The gigantic 
sculptures of Ninive prove this. As to the metal em- 
ployed in ' this work of art, we know that analogous 
statues existed; that of the sepulchre of Belus had forty 
cubits, and it was certainly not the only statue they had 
raised in this epoch. Finally, we have already pointed 
out the infideUty of a functionarywho, charged with the 
execution of a golden statue, had stolen a portion of 



THE PROPHET DANIEL. 483 

this precious metal " (" Babylone et la Chaldee," 

p. ^44)- 

We have to remark, however, that the Sacred Text 
does not say that the statue was of solid gold. Like 
many other statues it was probably only covered with, 
more or less thick, plates of gold. 

6. With regard to the story of the Uon's den into 
which Daniel was thrown, as well as that of the fiery 
furnace, they are strictly Babylonian. Assurbanipal 
tells us in his annals: " The rest of the people I threw 
alive amidst the bulls and lions, like Sennacherib, my 
father used to do." 

7. As to the objection drawn from the silence of all 
the ancient authors about Balthazar, King of Babylon, 
it is to-day a well established fact that Balthazar was 
the son of Nabonidus, the last of the Babylonian kings. 
In a prayer addressed to the god Sin (Moon), this prince 
expresses himself thus: '' In regard to Balthazar, my 
first-born son, the offspring of my heart, the fear of 
thy great deity, give that he may give himself up to 
Sin, and that he may not decHne from justice " (Cunei- 
form Inscriptions). From the Book of Daniel it goes 
forth that Balthazar was commander at Babylon whilst 
this city was beseiged by Cyrus, and that he held, not 
the first, but the second rank, in the kingdom; for, de- 
siring to give to the prophet the highest reward that 
was in his power, that is the first after him, he tells him 
that he will make him '' the third " of the kingdom 
(Dan. V, 16), which proves that he himself is only the 
second. The inscriptions of Nabonidus explain and 
confirm all these details. This monarch was outside the 
city; he had left the commandery to his eldest son, who 
thus found himself chars^ed with the defense of the 



484 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

capital and fulfilled the functions as king. What the 
Book of Daniel relates of Balthazar is so much more 
remarkable and conclusive in favor of its authenticity, 
because no ancient historian had preserved to us the 
name of the son of Nabonidus, and it was known to us 
only through the writings of the Jewish prophet, before 
it had been discovered within the latter years in the 
cuneiform inscriptions of the king, his father. Hence, 
it can be seen how the accusations of the infidels are 
false, and how the details from which they draw their 
objections transform themselves into proofs. 

8. THE CANTICLE OF THE THREE CHILDREN IN THE 
FIERY FURNACE. 

When the companions of Daniel had been thrown 
into the fiery furnace, because they had refused to adore 
the golden idol of Nabuchodonosor, Azarias addressed 
to God a prayer in order to implore His mercy, and he 
thanked the Lord together with his two friends by a 
hymn of thanksgiving. This prayer and hymn are not 
found in the Hebrew Bible, but we read them in the 
Greek version and in our Vulgate (Dan. iii, 24-90). The 
Protestants reject both as apocryphal, and the infidels 
regard all the deuterocanonical parts of the Book of 
Daniel as fictions. '' As to the legendary additions 
which the Greek version has joined to the Book of 
Daniel," says Kuenen, '' these additions rest upon no 
tradition and are principally the invention of the trans- 
lator or of somebody else." We will establish that the 
contested passages are authentic. 

The Greek translator has joined these fragments, 
particularly the prayer and the canticle of the young 
men in the fiery furnace, to the account of Daniel, 
because he has found them in the original. The first 



THE PROPHET DANIEL. ' 485 

proof which we can give for this, is that the prayer of 
Azarias and the canticle have been written primitively 
in Hebrew or in Aramaic. Although the most of the 
Protestants deny this, the fact is nevertheless so certain 
that several admit it, such as Bertholdt and Franz 
Delitzsch. The existence of the two Greek versions 
we have thereof, that of the Septuagint and that of 
Theodotion, can be explained only through one Semitic 
original. Even through the translations, the idioms 
can be easily recognized. MichaeHs, in his '* Oriental 
Library," has pointed a certain number, so also Welte 
in his " Special Introduction to the Deuterocanonicals " 
The wind is called for instance, '' spirit," pneuma (iii, 
65), because the word rouah has the double meaning 
of spirit and wind in the original. In the enumeration 
of the material beings which are invited to praise God, 
the cold and the dew are named twice (iii, 64-69). The 
reason for this repetition can be only, as Bertholdt has 
remarked, the translation by one and the same word, 
of two expressions different from the original, for the 
manner of the composition of the canticle excludes the 
double mention of one and the same thing. The Baby- 
lonians are designated under the name of apostates 
(xiv, 9) ; this qualification is improper, for one can apply 
it only to those who have abandoned the true religion; 
now the inhabitants of Babylon had never adored the 
true God. But the employ of this Greek expression 
can be easily understood when one supposes a Semitic 
term in a multiple sense, such as mordim, signifying 
at once rebel, apostate, enemy and stubborn. Hence, 
one cannot draw from the language In which the 
prayer and canticle have been written any objection 
against their authenticity. 



486 ' DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

To these philological reasons we can add that in the 
Codex chisianus the deuterocanonical part of chapter 
three of Daniel is marked with critical signs by which 
Origen, in his Hexaples, noted the differences between 
the Semitic original and Greek translations which prove 
that he had this original before him. 

The context can be alleged neither to establish 
the apocryphal character of our piece, whatever the 
Rationalists may pretend. Bertholdt, quite admitting 
the Semitic original, says: "In the hymn all is wanting. 
Not a single word becomes those in whose mouth it 
is placed. Only in the conclusion; there are some ex- 
pressions which agree to the situation, still they are 
very clumsy. The prayer of Azarias is more appro- 
priate to the circumstances, and nevertheless is also 
wanting here and there." According to Eichhorn, we 
should understand the '' sighs " of the companions of 
Daniel, '' under the stroke of a mortal anguish." On 
the contrary, ''all three pray as if they had prepared 
themselves and learned by heart before (I Dan. iii, 
88-90). 

9. THE HISTORY OF SUSANNA. 

The Rationalists do not admit the authenticity of 
the history of Susanna (Dan. xiii). According to them 
it is one of the " moral legends," Since the time of 
Porphyrins, the word-play of Daniel in regard to the 
execution which awaits the aged calumniators of Susan- 
na, is the principal source of accusation against the 
authenticity of this history. It cannot be denied, how- 
ever, that the Greek text, in which we have the history 
of Susanna, is a translation of the Semitic original. 
Indeed, we have two different Greek versions, that of 



THE PROPHET DANIEL. 487 

Theodotion, which has been adopted by the Church, 
and that of the Septuagint. Moreover, both versions 
are replete with Hebraisms. The conjunction and, 
continually repeated, is one of the most characteristic 
features of the Hebrew style. The expression '' as 
yesterday and the day before," meaning " as usually." 
is certainly not Greek. It may be said, it is true, that 
we meet with similar Hebraisms in the writings in Greek 
composed by the Hellenist Jews, but this has nothing 
to do with this case, as the Alexandrian version contains 
many less Hebraisms than the Theodotion, because the 
translator endeavored to write in pure Greek, and be- 
cause the difference between the two texts is a proof of 
the Semitic original. It is acknowledged by all Bibli- 
cists that the version of the Septuagint is not an edition 
corrected from that of Theodotion: the latter in its 
date is even posterior to the former. 

But how can we explain a purely Greek play on 
words with a Semitic original? It might be possible 
that the play on words did not exist at all in the primi- 
tive texts, but if it existed, which is the most probable, 
one can suppose, with Origen, who, in answering the 
difficulty which had been proposed to him by Julius 
Africanus, that the Semitic author had employed names 
of different trees, which lent themselves to a parom- 
asia in Chaldaic or in Hebrew, and that the Greek 
translator had substituted for these names those of 
other trees, which permitted him to preserve the play 
on words (Cf. Origen, " Epist. ad Afric." 12, vol. xi, 
col. yf). This explanation appears to be the most prob- 
able. 

When M. Reuss states that this '' play on words 
cannot be conceived in a translation," we may ask, how 



488 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

it happened that he put it into his own translation, not 
very successfully, perhaps, but nevertheless really. If 
M. Reuss could play on French words from the Greek 
word play, why should the Greek translator not have 
been able to do the same from the Hebrew? 

The other assertions of the infidels against the au- 
thenticity of the history of Susanna are scarcely worthy 
of mention. Susanna was not judged, they say, con- 
formably to the law. Certainly the judges who con- 
demned her were iniquitous, but the procedure which 
they followed was founded exteriorly on regular order 
and conformable to the Jewish customs, which the cap- 
tives in Chaldea were permitted to follow. 

How, the objectors add, could the people consent 
so easily to take up again the cause, at the demand of 
a young man? Because this young man was undoubt- 
edly noted for wisdom, or, at any event, because he was 
a member of one of the first Jewish families and lived at 
the court of the King of Babylon, which gave to him 
an authority beyond his age. 

'' The social position," says Reuss, '' of the husband 
of Susanna cannot be accounted for." And why should 
it be accounted for? The sacred historian stated only 
what was necessary to make his account clear; he tells 
that Susanna was the wife of an important personage 
among the Jews, and this was sufficient for him and 
must be sufficient for us. 

ID. BEL AND THE DRAGON. 

The Book of Daniel relates in its deuterocanonical 
part, the history of the destruction of the idol of Bel. 
This deity had a statue to which they offered each day- 
sheep, flour and wine; the priests entered each into the 



THE PROPHET JONAS. 489 

temple, appropriated for themselves these offerings 
and made the people believe that the idol had eaten 
them. Daniel micovered to Darius the stratagem, 
and thus caused the destruction of the idol and its 
temple (xiv, 1-21). The authenticity of this episode 
has been lively attacked by both Rationalists and Prot- 
estants; but to-day one has to acknowledge that the 
author was a contemporary of the facts which he relates, 
and that his account offers all the characters of veracity, 
for the native monuments confirm all the details 
which make allusion to the Babylonian customs: the 
worship of Bel was in great honor at Babylon; they 
also offered there nourishment to idols, for Nabucho- 
donosor, in an inscription, mentions the presents which 
he daily deposited on the table of the gods Marduch 
and Zilbanit: an entire ox, fish, fowl, honey, wine, etc. 
Hence, the author must have been well acquainted with 
the Babylonian customs to describe this episode. 



CHAPTER XLVIII. 



THE PROPHET JONAS. 

THE Book of Jonas, of all Biblical Books, has been 
one of the most attacked by the Rationalists. 
Since the end of the last century they have endeavored 
to eliminate from it the supernatural facts; the contem- 
porary infidels consider it as a fiction. The real reason 
why the history of Jonas is thus treated is, because it 



490 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

contains too great a number of miracles for the rational- 
istic fancy. However, the infidels do not dare to con- 
demn this writing solely because of the prodigies it 
relates, therefore, they seek to justify the sentence they 
pronounce against it in many ways. Behold their 
principal objections made to it: How can we believe, 
they say, that all the inhabitants of Ninive became 
converted to Jehovah, after having heard for one day the 
preaching of the Israelitic prophet? Admitting that he 
spoke their language, how could he have created so 
great a revolution in the religious opinion of a people 
who had an established worship of their own, and who 
knew nothing of the worship of Jehovah? If really the 
Ninivites became converted, would one not have been 
careful to instruct them further in their new worship. 

2. THESE OBJECTIONS ARE VERY WEAK. 

They depict, on the part of the authors, a complete 
ignorance of the religion of Ninive. The Assyrians 
had been profoundly religious, as their inscriptions 
and their books denote. They bad their national 
deities, but they beHeved that the other nations had 
equally their deities, not less real and not less endowed 
with power, although perhaps of an inferior power to- 
their own. Moreover, they were very credulous and 
even superstitious, as is attested by the numerous magic 
writings discovered in the royal library of Assurbanipal. 
Hence, they were inclined to give heed to the prophets 
and to the oracles even of a foreign God. The idea of 
contesting the divinity of Jehovah, His power and His 
knowledge of coming events could never enter their 
mind, for they had no doubt about it. Consequently, 
t he prediction of Jonas to Ninive is not so extraordinary 



THE PROPHET JONAS. 49 1 

as the Rationalists maintain. The prophet did not 
preach there only on one day, but during three days 
(Jonas iii, 3). The fact that he was a foreigner attracted 
only the more attention. The text tells us formally 
that the King of Assyria believed in his word (iii, 6), and 
that it was by order of this prince that the whole city 
did penance. The power of the king was so absolute 
that his order is sufficient to explain all that the Niniv- 
ites did. They fasted and '' God saw their works, that 
they were turned from their evil way and had mercy 
with regard to the evil which He had said that He 
would do to them, and He did not " (iii, 10). The 
sacred writer does not tell at all that they became Jews 
and that they adopted the Jewish rehgion; the language 
he employs supposes ev^en the contrary; he says merely 
that they did penance for their crimes. Hence, the 
prophet had no reason " to instruct them beforehand 
in the new worship," because they did not accept a new 
worship. 

The infidel criticism further complains because 
Jonas did not relate his history more at length. But 
why should Jonas do this? No prophet has done so. 
Neither do we need '' to know the name of the king of 
Ninive." It was probably Binnirar, called also Ram- 
manirar. In every case we know for certain the 
approximate date of his reign, because we know by the 
Books of Kings that the prophet Jonas lived under 
Jeroboam II., King of Israel (824-809). When the 
Book of Jonas does not state who the king of Ninive 
was, it is because its author saw no necessity in telling 
us. The same silence is maintained, and for the same 
reason, in regard to the after conduct of the Ninivites 
and in regard to the prophet after his prediction. The 



492 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

author wished to write a historic account, but in doing 
so, he had also in view a useful and edifying object, and 
he composed a work " into the structure of which 
should enter, consequently, only the particularities 
which could further the end he had in view." It is a 
Rationalist who makes this admission. 



3. JONAS IN THE WHALE S BELLY. 

The negative criticism attacks also the Book of 
Jonas in regard to the wonderful fact of the prophet's 
stay for three days in the belly of a fish. As to what 
character of fish it was that swallowed Jonas we do not 
know. We say generally that it was a whale, but this 
fish is seldom met with in the Mediterranean Sea, and 
besides, its narrow mouth would prevent the swallowing 
of a man. The Sacred Text defines no particular kind 
of fish ; it simply says " a great fish." It is very probable 
that it was a large voracious shark, squalus carcharias 
Linnei, numerous in the Mediterranean, and which 
devours greedily all it can get hold off. A horse has 
been found in the belly of one of these fishes which 
weighed ten thousand pounds, and was caught on the 
Island St. Marguerite, France. In another they found 
a man with his armor on (See Lapide, '^ Historic des 
Poissons," vol. i, p. 189; Starck, "Animal Kingdom," 

P- 305)- 

A still more interesting fact is related as follows: 
*' It happened in 1758 that, during a storm, a sailor fell 
overboard from a frigate, and as he was endeavoring to 
regain the vessel a shark appeared and seized him. 
Other sailors on the frigate, who had witnessed the 
catastrophe hastened into a small boat to render their 



THE PROPHET ZACHARIAS. 493 

companion assistance. They were too late, however, to 
be of service, the victim disappeared while still calling 
for help, into the capacious maw of the monster. At this 
moment the captain of the frigate, who had obtained a 
rifle, was sufiiciently cool to aim it with precision at 
the shark, now rapidly swimming away with its victim. 
The captain fired and the fish, struck in a vital spot, 
released its captive, who was rescued by the sailors in 
the small boat, still alive and only slightly injured. The 
fish itself was caught by the sailors with harpoons and 
ropes, drawn aboard the frigate, and suspended there to 
dry. The captain afterward donated the shark to the 
sailor saved in such an extraordinary manner, and the 
latter exhibited it in nearly all the European cities (Cf. 
Des Ritter's Carl von Lenne, " Vollstsendige Natur- 
System," Nuremberg, 1774, pp. 268-269). 

We have to add, however, that whatever was the 
character of the fish which swallowed Jonas, it is quite 
evident that he could not have remained in its belly for 
three days only by means of a miracle. 



CHAPTER XLIX. 



THE PR OP HE T ZA CHA RIA S. 

THE authenticity of the third section of the Book 
of Zacharias is denied in the present day by a cer- 
tain number of critics. Condensed, their arguments 
are in the number of three: i. St. Matthew attributes 
(xxvii, 9) a passage of this third section (Zach. xi, 12) 



494 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

not to Zacharias, but to Jeremias; consequently, at the 
time of our Lord chapters nine and fourteen of Zacha- 
rias were not entered among his prophecies. 2. The 
chapters nine and fourteen, according to their contents, 
must have been written before the Captivity. 3. The 
style of the chapters one and eight and nine and four- 
teen are totally different. 

To these objections we can answer in the following 
manner: i. Because St. Matthew attributes to Jeremias 
a prophetic text which we do not read as such either 
in Jeremias or in Zacharias, it does not follow by any 
means that the latter is not authentic. '' I am afraid 
that they (the critics who deny the authenticity) under- 
take too much in wishing to contest three chapters of 
Zacharias in order to restore one single passage to Jere- 
mias," justly remarks Calmet (in Matthew xvii, 9). 
The proof that the objection is without value is, that 
nobody does attribute to Jeremias the last part of 
Zacharias, as should follow if the Rationalists' argument 
was built on solid ground. 

2. The objection against the authenticity of cha'pters 
nine and fourteen, derived from statements which 
they contain, would be decisive, if it were true. It is 
alleged that we find proofs therein that they have been 
written before the Captivity, but these proofs do not 
exist. The return from Captivity is pictured as a scene 
of rejoicing, and described in a like manner in both 
parts of Zacharias (Cf. Zach. ii, 10 and ix, 12; ii, 10 and ix, 
9; ii, 14 and ix, 9, etc.). The author of chapters nine and 
fourteen is so little anterior to the taking of Jerusalem 
by Nabuchodonosor, that he has made use of the writ- 
ings of the prophets who lived in this epoch. There is 
not one single word in the second part of Zacharias 



AUTHENTICITY OF THE GOSPELS IN GENERAL. 495 

which does not fit in with the time of the Persian dom- 
ination. 

3. The last objcetion derived from the difference of 
style which is noticeable in the first eight chapters from 
that in the six following, has this much of a foundation, 
that there is not a complete resemblance in the con- 
struction of the two parts; but the conclusion that they 
were written by different writers is not logical, because 
variation in structure and terminology is explained in 
the fact that the subject treated of is not the same in 
both places. The visions cannot be described in the 
same terms and in the same manner as the future glory 
of Jerusalem, w^hich is unfolded in the final tableau; 
the wording of a narrator is not that of the orator or 
poet. Osee expresses himself quite differently (i-iii and 
iv-xiv; Ezechiel, vi-vii and iv). Besides we meet the 
same characteristic phraseology in the two parts of 
Zacharias (vii, 14 and ix, 8, transiens (euntes) et rever- 
tens); the eye of God for Providence (iii, 9; iv, 10; ix, 
I, 8, etc.). The last chapters, as well as the first of 
Zacharias belong therefore to the prophet. 



CHAPTER L. 



AUTHENTICITT OF THE GOSPELS IN GENERAL. 

TO judge about the historic value of an ancient book, 
it is necCvSsary first, to know the person and the 
qaalities of the writer; one must, moreover, have the 
certitude that the work of the writer has reached us 
without having undergone any notable changes; finally. 



49^ DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

it is necessary that it establishes the knowledge, the 
judgment and the probity of the author. Therefore, 
WQ. have to treat successively: i. Of the authenticity; 
2. Of the integrity; 3. Of the veracity of our Sacred 
Gospels. 

Since the most remote antiquity the Christian 
Church has acknowledged as portions of the Sacred 
vScriptures four Gospels, neither more nor less, and has 
attributed them to four determined authors, of whom 
two belonged to the apostolic college, namely Matthew 
and John, the two others, disciples of the apostles, 
Mark and Luke. 

GENERAL PROOFS. 

Since the second century of the Christian era, St. 
Irenaeus (about 40 towards 202 A. D.) affirms with the 
greatest precision, that there are four canonical Gos- 
pels, and his testimony is so much more valuable and 
important because a native of Asia Minor, disciple of 
St. Polycarpus of Smyrna and bishop of Lyons, he is as 
the voice of the Churches of both the Orient and Occi- 
dent: ''The belief about the four Gospels," he says, 
" is so firmly established that the heretics themselves 
render testimony to them, and all those among them 
who separate themselves from us, try to confirm their 
own doctrine through the authority of the Gospels. 
The Ebionites, making use of the sole Gospel according 
to St. Matthew, are convinced by this Gospel that they 
do not think about the Lord with rectitude. Marcion, 
who cuts ofT a part of the Gospel of St. Luke, has shown 
himself a blasphemer against the only God through that 
which he preserves thereof. Those who separate 
Jesus Christ and say that Christ has remained impassi- 



AUTHENTICITY OF THE GOSPELS IN GENERAL. 497 

ble whilst Jesus has suffered, can correct themselves oi 
their errors when they read with the love of truth the 
Gospel according to St. Mark which has their prefer- 
ences. The sectarians of Valentinus who make 
abundant use of the Gospel according to St. John to 
establish their conjectures, can discover therein that 
they do not speak the truth. . . . Since, therefore, 
those who oppose themselves to us render such a testi- 
mony and make use of these books, the proof which we 
draw from them against them is well established and 
true. For there is neither a greater number nor a less 
number of Gospels. As there are four cardinal points 
in the world which we inhabit, and four principal winds 
(spirits), as the Church is spread over the whole earth, 
and as the Gospel with the Spirit of Life is the column 
and firmament of the Church, it is becoming that the 
Church should have four columns, breathing all over 
incorruptibility and vivifying men. Whence it is 
manifest that the Word, author of every creature, who 
is seated above the Cherubim and contains all things, 
having appeared in the midst of men, has given to us a 
quadruple Gospel, animated by the same spirit. . . . 
Therefore, things being thus, all those are vain, igno- 
rant and audacious, who disfigure the beauty of the Gos- 
pel and admit more or less Gospels than those which 
have been enumerated."^ St. Irenseus has written 
also the following remarkable words: " In spite of the 
diversity of languages spoken in the world, the power 
of tradition is all over the same. The churches of Ger- 
many have not in this respect a creed different from that 
which is received in Spain and by the Celts. The 
churches founded in the extremities of the Orient, 

* St. Irenaens, Cont, Haer. iii, xi, 7-9. 
D. B.— 32 



498 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

of Egypt, of Lybia, publish these same facts in the 
manner as the churches placed in the center of the 
world. And as one sole sun lightens the entire universe, 
one sole and the same Hght, a preaching perfectly uni- 
form of the truth, lightens all men who desire to arrive 
at the knowledge of this truth." ^ 

This testimony of St. Irenseus is categorical. Those 
of Clement of Alexandria and of Tertullian are not less 
this. In his " Stromata," the Egyptian doctor opposes 
to the false and apocryphal Gospels " the four Gospels 
which have been transmitted by tradition,"^ and his 
*' Hypotyposes," he reports the following words of an 
ancient: '' He said," he wrote, " that the first Gospels 
which had been drawn up are those which contain the 
genealogies. That of Mark was composed on the occa- 
sion as follows: when Peter had preached publicly the 
Word at Rome and promulgated the Gospel, under 
the inspiration of the Spirit, many of his hearers 
exhorted Mark, who accompanied him since a long 
time and knew by heart what the Apostle had said, to 
consign by writing what he had heard. Having there- 
fore written his Gospel, Mark gave it to those who had 
asked him for it. Peter, having learned of this did not 
encourage him publicly, but did not dissuade him 
either. As to John, the last of the Evangelists, as he 
saw that the other Gospels made known the corporal 
history of Christ, at the request of those who lived with 
him and inspired by the Holy Ghost, he wrote the 
Spiritual Gospel."""^ 

Let us listen now to Tertullian: " The Gospels have 

" St. Irenseus, Cont. Haer. i, x, 2. 

2 Clement of Alexandria, Strom, iii, 13. 

^ Clement of Alexandria in Eusebius, H. E. vi, 14. 



AUTHENTICITY OF THE GOSPELS IN GENERAL. 499 

for authors the apostles, to whom the Lord Himself 
intrusted the mission to promulgate (His doctrine) 
and the apostolic men (who wrote them), not alone, 
but with the apostles and according to the apostles. 
. Among the apostles, John and Matthew com- 
municate to us the faith, among the apostohc men, 
Luke and Mark renew it."^ 

The belief of the Church about the origin of our 
Gospels in Asia and in Gaul, in Egypt and in Africa, 
in the epoch when these ecclesiastical writers flourished 
is, therefore, incontestable. Strauss himself admits this: 
'' About the end of the second century of our era," he 
says, '' our four Gospels, as can be seen by the writings 
of three doctors of the Church, Irenseus, Clement of 
Alexandria and Tertullian, were known as deriving 
from the apostles and disciples of the apostles, among 
the orthodox, and in quality of authentic documents 
about Jesus, they had been separated from a number of 
other similar productions."^ But, quite acknowledg- 
ing these facts, which are clear as daylight, the rational- 
istic critics contest nevertheless the authenticity and 
veracity of our four Gospels. Therefore, we will estab- 
lish against them that the canonical Gospels are from 
the authors whose name they bear, and that their ac- 
counts are worthy of faith. 

1 Tertullian, Adv. Marc. iv. 2. 
^ D. Strauss, " Leben Jesu." 



CHAPTER LI. 



AUTHENTICITT OF THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO 
ST. MATTHEW. 

I. FORMAL TESTIMONIES OF ANTIQUITY. 

THE most important of all is that of St. Papias, 
bishop of Heirapolis, disciple of the Apostle St. 
John. In a passage, preserved to us by Eusebius, he 
says: " Matthew has written in Hebrew the discourses 
(logia) of the Saviour." This testimony is decisive. 
Attempts have been made to diminish its value, in pre- 
tending that Papias meant to speak only of a collection 
of discourses of Jesus, but this is not the meaning of 
his words. For what proves that the logia of St. Mat- 
thew did not exclude the narrative of the facts, is that 
Papias himself had entitled his work: '' Commentary on 
the Logia of the Lord." Even Renan admits that the 
writing of Matthew of which Papias speaks, might very 
well contain accounts of the actions. This having been 
acquired, the supposition of the adversaries, who behold 
in this evangehcal writing only a first foundation of the 
canonical Gospel, is absolutely false. It will be shown 
further on that it is inadmissible. Rationalism also 
tries to elude its probatory value, by declaring it not 
receivable, as being derived from another man destitute 
of judgment. Papias, according to Eusebius, was 
quite a learned mind. But to this we answer that: 
I. This appreciation of Eusebius is full of exaggeration, 
(500) 



AUTHENTICITY OF THE GOSPEL. 50I 

and seems to have no other foundation but the millen- 
ary opinion of Papias ; m the words themselves of Papias 
quoted by Eusebius, this Father shows himself full of 
solicitude to collect from the mouth of the apostolic 
men the true traditions of the primitive Church; 2. A 
man of relatively limited mind, however, judged capa- 
ble to govern as bishop an important Church, and an 
author of a work worthy of drawing the attention of a 
savant like Eusebius, had certainly intelligence enough 
to distinguish whether, yes or no, the Apostle Matthew 
had written in Hebrew a history of the Saviour. Had 
this history been another than our canonical Gospel, 
the writing of Matthew pointed out by Papias, would 
have left among the Fathers of the second century some 
trace of its existence. Now, these Fathers as we are 
going to see, knew no other writing of Matthew but our 
first Gospel. The testimony of St. Papias is therefore 
incontestable. 

Besides it is supported by that of St. Iren^eus, bishop 
of Lyons, in Gaul, about 178 A. D., whither he had 
emigrated from Minor Asia. He was a disciple of St. 
Polycarp, and according to St. Jerome, also of Papias. 
In his work against the heresies of his time, he states: 
" Matthew has published among the Hebrews, in their 
dialect, also a writ of the Gospel " (Haer. iii, 14, 3-4). 
A contemporary of St. Irenaeus, the famous founder of 
the Catechetical School at Alexandria, St. Pantenus, 
having gone to preach the faith to the Hindoos, that is, 
to the Arabs of Arabia Felix, found among them, says 
Eusebius, the Gospel of St. Matthew, written in Hebrew 
characters, which had been brought to them through 
the Apostle St. Bartholomew. Titian, disciple of St. 
Justin, flourished in the second century, knew so well 



502 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

our Gospels that he composed a concord«ance about 
them entitled Diatesseron, that is, the work of the four. 
Clement of Alexandria, who was ordained priest in the 
year 195 A. D., states the same; and Tertullian, who was 
born in the year 163 A. D., and died in 242, calls St. 
Matthews the most faithful commentator of the Gospel. 
We come to produce testimonies taken in the 
Churches of Asia, Gaul, Africa, Syria and Egypt. The 
Church of Rome, also possesses a monument of the 
second century, wherein mention is made of the Gospels: 
it is the fragmentary Canon, discovered by Muratori. 
The beginning thereof is lost. But since the part pre- 
served mentions the third Gospel, as being from St. 
Luke, the fourth of St. John, no doubt the part lost 
makes mention of the Gospels of St. Matthew and of 
St. Mark. 

2. INDIRECT TESTIMONIES. 

We rank under this title the ancient manuscripts 
and the ancient versions of the New Testament, as well 
as the quotations of the writers of the first centuries. 
All the manuscripts bear at the head of the first Gospel 
the inscription: According to Matthew. Now, among 
the versions, there are two, the Latin and the Syriac, 
which go back to the first half of the second century. 
Among all the books of the New Testament, there is not 
one which the ancient Fathers and heretics of the prim- 
itive Church quote more often than the Gospel of St. 
Matthew. St. Clement of Rome (Cor. xiii), St. Poly- 
carp (Phil, ii), St. Ignatius of Antioch (Polyc. ii and 
Smyrna i) report words of the Saviour, consigned in 
this Gospel. The book entitled '' Doctrine of the 
Apostles," whose primitive text has been discovered 



AUTHENTICITY OF THE GOSPEL. 503 

quite recently, and which goes back perhaps to the first 
century (n. i, 3, 7, 8, 15) also gives many sentences of 
our Lord, contained almost Hterally in our St. Matthew. 
It says among other things : " Do not pray as hypocrites ; 
but pray as the Lord has ordained in his Gospel: Our 
Father, etc." Then the Lord's Prayer follows exactly 
according to the formula of the first Gospel. The 
works of St. Justin are full of quotations, almost 
textually, of our Gospel; and it is very gratuitously 
that the rationahstic authors pretend that this Father 
had in hand a primitive Gospel which served as a 
sketch to our synoptic Gospels. St. Justin is no more 
literal in his quotations of the Old Testament than 
in those of the Gospel. It is, besides, certain that this 
Father knew several canonical Gospels, because he 
attributes the composition of the Gospels to the apos- 
tles and to their disciples. We know through Origen 
that the pagan Celsus had also our Gospel. In his 
attacks against the Christians he speaks, among other 
things, of the arrival of the Magi, of the massacre of the 
Innocent Children, of the Flight into Egypt, all facts 
related by St. Matthew. Finally, when we pass to the 
Gnostics of this remote epoch, we learn through St. 
Epiphanes (Hser. xxiv, 5), that the Nazareans and the 
Ebionites had the Gospel of St. Matthew. Valentinus 
and Basilides often made use of it to support their 
errors, and a Gnostic book, found a few years ago, 
quotes in about twenty places texts from the same 
Gospel. 

From all these documents it results that in the 
second century the Gospel of St. Matthew, such as we 
possess it to-day, was known and received all over, as 
the work of this apostle, not only by the CathoHcs, but 



504 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

even the heretics and infidels. From which we have to 
conclude that, since the first century, it must have been 
held as authentic in Palestine, where it was composed; 
without this, we cannot explain how all the Churches 
could have been, in so short a time, agreed to regard it 
as authentic. But, when since the first century it was 
attributed to St. Mathew in the very place where it 
was published, one cannot doubt that it was really from 
this apostle. A falsifier would not have succeeded in 
passing his work for that of an apostle, among the 
faithful who wxre the immediate disciples of the 
apostles. 

3. INTRINSIC ARGUMENTS. 

According to tradition, the first of our canonical 
Gospels was composed by St. Matthew, formerly a pub- 
lican, and became one of the twelve privileged disciples 
of Jesus. The Book was addressed to the converted 
Jews, and had for principal end to confirm them in the 
faith by showing them, in Jesus of Nazareth, the fulfill- 
ment of the Messianic prophecies of the Old Testament. 
Our first Gospel answers perfectly to these traditional 
accounts. This Gospel alone teaches us that the 
Apostle Matthew was at first a publican, that he called 
himself Levi ; he describes in detail the vocation of 
this apostle. He speaks constantly of the Jewish insti- 
tutions as of things known by his readers, whilst the 
other Evangelists are careful to give an explanation 
thereof. He supposes his readers acquainted with 
the geography and the political divisions of the Holy 
Land. The Evangelist in following step by step the 
vSaviour in His conception, birth, hidden life, and His 
public life, points out each halting place how Jesus 



AUTHENTICITY OF THE GOSPEL. 505. 

realizes in His person the prophecies of the Old Law. 
This he shows at least in twenty places, without count- 
ing several allusions, perfectly clear, to these divine 
oracles. The prophetic quotations are ordinarily pre- 
ceded by the formula: In order that may be fulfilled what 
the prophet says. 

Both the extrinsic and intrinsic testimonies of the 
Gospel of St. Matthew estabhsh, therefore, its authen- 
ticity. 



CHAPTER UI. 



AUTHENTICITT OF THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO 
ST. MARK. 

I. FORMAL TESTIMONIES OF ANTIQUITY. 

FOR the second, as for the first Gospel, the most 
weighty testimony is that of St. Papias: "The priest 
(John)," he says, '' related also that Mark, the inter- 
preter of Peter, has written exactly that which has been 
said and done by Christ, as much as he retained it in 
his memory (from the preaching of Peter), yet not in 
order; for he has neither heard the Lord, nor followed 
him, but he had attached himself, as I have said, to the 
steps of Peter, who used to teach according to the 
circumstances and not as one who intended a regular 
composition of the works of the Lord. Hence, Mark 
committed no fault, writing a part of them so, as he 
remembered them: for of one thing he took care, that 
is. to omit nothing of what he had heard, and not to 
falsify anything in them." (" Hist, eccl.," iii, 39). 



506 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

The modern critics, to escape the evidence of these 
words, pretend that this writing of Mark is not the Gos- 
pel which we read under his name, but an abridgement 
of the preaching of Peter, of which the second Evange- 
Hst has profited in making changes and additions to it. 
For, say they, the writing of Mark was a compilation 
without order, whilst our second Gospel offers well 
coordained accounts. We answer that the saying of 
Papias is sufficiently justified by the absence of chrono- 
logical order, in the exposition of '' some " of the things 
reported by Mark; for this characteristic is exactly 
found in our Gospel of Mark. Therefore, we have to 
understand the passage of Papias, as it has been under- 
stood by Eusebius, in regard to the canonical Gospel 
according to St. Mark. In understanding it thus, 
we will put the teaching of the Apostolic Eather in per- 
fect harmony with that of St. Irenseus, who reports the 
following incontestable testimony of the second cen- 
tury: ''After the departure (death) of them (of Peter 
and Paul), Mark the disciple and interpreter of Peter, 
also has written the preaching of the Gospel, and be- 
queathed it to us" (I-Iser. iii, i); a testimony whose 
meaning is completely precised by two others, about 
contemporaries, that of Clement of Alexandria and that 
of Origen, who expHcitly tell us that Mark, in his 
Gospel (the second Gospel, says Origen) wrote down 
what he remembered from the teachings of Peter. 

The Western Church has not remained dumb in 
regard to the fact that occupies us. Indeed the 
Scriptural catalogue of Muratori (Roman document 
of the second century) opens by these words, referring 
to the second Evangelist : Quibus tarnen interfuit et ita 
postiit, which signifies, undoubtedly, that the author of 



AUTHENTICITY OF THE GOSPEL. 507 

the second Gospel was present at the preachings of Peter 
and consigning them by writ gave us a faithful account 
of them. Africanus tells us, in his turn, through the 
mouth of Tertullian: ''The Gospel edited by Mark is 
affirmed to be that of Peter, whose interpreter Mark was 
(Adv. Marcion, iv, 5). 

2. INDIRECT TESTIMONIES. 

All the manuscripts and all the ancient versions 
contain our second Gospel with the inscription: Accord- 
ing to St. Mark. We find it quoted much more rarely 
by the Fathers of the second and of the third centuries, 
which is due because it contains almost nothing that 
is not already related by Matthew or Luke. However, 
it can hardly be doubted, that St. Justin did only learn 
from this Gospel that the sons of Zebedee were called 
by the Lord, Children of Thunder, because Mark is the 
only evangelist that gives this detail. In fact, he says, 
this is written in the Commentaries of Peter; as if he 
were saying: in the Gospel of Peter, because he calls 
the Gospels Commentaries of the Apostles. 

3. INTRINSIC ARGUMENTS. 

Amongst the synoptic Evangelists, the second is the 
one who relates the facts with the most minute details 
and with characteristic circumstances so striking, that 
he could learn them only from an eye witness. Although 
this Gospel is the shortest, it is the most complete in 
teaching about the facts and actions of Peter, particu- 
larly about those which are not to the honor of the apos- 
tle, for example, his threefold denial. On the contrary, 
that which is to his credit seems to be purposely left in 
the shadow, for instance, the magnificent praise given 



508 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

to his faith by the Saviour, when Peter came to confess 
the Son of God before his colleagues in the apostolate. 
Mark, interpreter of Peter, answers to these indications. 
It is also manifest that the second Gospel was addressed, 
not to the inhabitants of Palestine, but especially to 
the Romans. The Hebrew words which he employs 
are carefully translated; the Jewish customs explained, 
and we find therein Latin technical terms, for example, 
in chapter twelve, verse forty-two, the word quadrans. 
lience, everything corroborates the primitive tradition, 
attributing the authority of the second canonical Gos-^ 
pel to Mark, disciple of St. Peter, and places its compo- 
sition at Rome, whilst the prince of the apostles was 
still alive. The Gospel of Mark gives us an abridgment 
of the preaching of Peter. 



CHAPTER LHl. 



AUTHENTICITT OF THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO 
ST. LUKE. 

I. FORMAL TESTIMONIES OF ANTIQUITY. 

THE Catalogue of Muratori gives us an irrefutable 
testimony from the second century: '' The third 
book of the Gospel according to Luke. This Luke, 
physician, whom Paul, after the ascension of the Lord, 
associated in his labors, . . . wrote in his own 
name according to the ideas of this (Paul). Plowever, 
he did not see the Saviour in the flesh, and on account of 
this (he relates the facts), as he could inform himself 



AUTHENTICITY OF THE GOSPEL. 509 

about them. It is thus that he commences to speak of 
the birth of John." Tertuhian reproaches Marcion for 
having altered the Gospel of Luke. This Gospel, he 
says, is received by all the churches; Marcion, on the 
contrary, is an unknown person. He claims in favor 
of this writing even the authority of the apostles, for he 
says, '* the composition of Luke is generally attributed 
to Paul " (" Adv. Marcion," iv. 5). St. Iren^us re- 
ports the same tradition: " Luke, disciple of Paul, con- 
signed into a book the Gospel preached by Paul " 
(Hser. iii, 11). He even gives of the Gospel of Luke 
a detailed analysis, answering exactly to our third can- 
onical Gospel (Hser. iii, 14, 3, 4). Clement of Alex- 
andria invokes in proof of one of his assertions, the 
Gospel according to Luke (Strom, i, 21), and Origen 
counts the Gospel according to Luke among the four, 
"' which alone were admitted without contestation in 
the universal Church " ('' Ap. Euseb. Hist" eccl. vi, 25). 

2. INDIRECT TESTIMONIES. 

All the ancient manuscripts and all the ancient ver- 
sions give to the third Gospel the inscription: Accord- 
ing to Luke. St. Justin, a Father of the second cen- 
tury, reports the history of the Annunciation; he gives 
about the birth of the Saviour details which are found 
only in St. Luke; he says that "the apostles, in their 
commentaries, called Gospels, have taught us that Jesus 
gave to them the order (to consecrate the bread and the 
wine); that Jesus, indeed, having taken bread and hav- 
ing rendered thanks, has said: " Do this in commemo- 
ration of me " (Apol. i, (^6), Luke is the only Evange- 
list that reports these words. The letter of the Church 
of Vienne, document of the second century, applies to 



5IO DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

the martyrs of this city the eulogy which St. Luke 
awards to the priest Zacharias ('' Ap. Euseb. Hist." eccl. 
V, i). The Gnostics also render testimony to the 
authenticity of this Gospel. Basilides explains in a 
heretical sense the words of the angel Gabriel; Valen- 
tinus, according to the saying of St. Irenaeus, employs 
several Sacred Texts which are only found in St. Luke; 
finally, Marcion, rejecting the other Gospels, admitted 
only that of St. Luke in making him undergo mutila- 
tions and interpolations. The pagan Celsus speaks 
of the double genealogy of Jesus, of the apparition of 
angels at the tomb of the Saviour, and finds the Evange- 
lists in contradiction, because one speaks of two angels, 
and the other of one only, as having appeared to the 
women. It is, therefore, evident that, since the second 
century, the third Gospel was universally received as 
a Sacred Book, and attributed to St. Luke, disciple of 
St. Paul. 

3. INTRINSIC ARGUMENTS. 

In considering closely the third canonical Gospel, 
one easily discovers therein several indications that 
betray the influence of St. Paul, and thus answer to 
tradition, according to which the third Evangelist is a 
disciple of the great apostle, and whose special pur- 
pose it was to reproduce in his writing the teaching 
of his Divine Master. There is in the first place, be- 
tween the third Gospel and the Epistles of St. Paul, a 
verbal concordance of the most striking facts. Several 
expressions, common to both, are hardly found under 
the pen of other writers of the New Testament. The 
words of the institution of the Blessed Eucharist are 
reported in the same manner by St. Paul, in the first 



OBJECTIONS. 5 1 1 

Epistle to the Corinthians (vi, 24-25), whilst they are 
different in St. Matthew and St. Mark. The order of 
the apparitions of Christ risen is the same in the third 
Gospel and in the first Epistle to the Corinthians (xv, 
5-7). Let us add that the style of our EvangeUst is 
purer and less Hebraist than that of the two other 
synoptics, a quality which answers very well to the 
Hellenic origin, and to the more careful instruction of 
St. Luke, physician, born at Antioch, the wealthy capi- 
tal of Syria. Finally, the third Gospel is manifestly 
addressed to the converted Gentiles. Who other than 
a companion of St. Paul was more fit to fulfill a similar 
task? 



CHAPTER LIV. 



OBJECTIONS AGAINST THE AUTHENTICITT OF 
THE THREE STNOPTTC GOSPELS. 

BEFORE occupying ourselves with the authenticity 
of the fourth Gospel, we will examine first what 
one opposes to the authenticity of the first three. 
Their cause is about common, and differs notably from 
that of the fourth. 

Everybody knows that there are among the first 
three Gospels a great resemblance, beginning with the 
account of the public life of Christ. We find therein 
related about the same facts, in the same order, and 
often considerable passages corresponding among one 
another almost word for word. But, aside from these 
resemblances, there are also very considerable differ- 
ences, either for the details of facts, or for the order of 



512 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

accounts, or for the expressions. These resemblances 
and divergences require an explanation. In the ration- 
aUstic schools, this explanation is founded upon the 
negation of the authenticity of the three writings. The 
resemblances, they say, suppose a common foundation 
upon which the three authors or the three respective 
predecessors have labored; the divergences are the 
results of successive rehandlings, to which several un- 
knov/n hands have contributed their contingent, and 
who answered to the unconscious evolution of the 
popular traditions, among the different surroundings 
where the Christian communities became established. 

According to this system, our Gospels are personal 
compositions, so to say, escaping all responsibility, as 
well as all control. Eichhorn supposes the existence 
of a very elementary primitive Gospel, drawn up in 
Aramaic by the apostles in common, to serve to them 
as uniform catechetical formula. From this the com- 
mon elements of the three Synoptics are derived; that 
what is common to two only owes its origin to a first 
rehandling of the primitive writing. As to that what 
is proper to one only, we have to attribute it, either to 
a common foundation, or to further rehandlings. They 
made answer to Eichhorn that a primitive Aramaic Gos- 
pel rendered a good enough account of the resemblances 
regarding the facts and the order of the accounts, but 
that it did not explain the verbal concordance of three 
Greek compositions: for one same Aramaic original 
would have been translated in different terms by three 
writers that had not planned together. Hence, the 
reason why this doctor modified afterwards his opinion, 
in supposing for common foundation a Greek version 
of the primitive Gospel. One generally believed to 



OBJECTIONS. 513 

find this primitive Gospel in the Logia, attributed by 
Papias to the Apostle St. Matthew, or in the book 
which the same writer attributes to St. Mark. The 
idea of Eichhorn was worked in various manners by 
other critics. They subjected the three Gospels to a 
sort of an anatomic analysis, they classed by groups the 
different passages; each group received its place in a 
determined series of rehandlings; and from this fanatical 
genesis they made arise the three canonical books, such 
as we possess them to-day. Gratz, Ewald, Reville and 
Holzman distinguished themselves in these studies, 
wherein the ridiculous is in dispute with the arbitrary. 

To o\'erthrow with one stroke all these theories, it 
is sufficient to remark that this primitive Gospel, or at 
least the numerous rehandlings which one should have 
made it undergo, could not fail to leave in history some 
trace of their existence. Now, the adversaries them- 
selves have to admit that not only all these rehandlings 
as well as this primitive Gospel have never been seen 
by any witness of the primitive Church, but we find 
nowhere the least mention thereof, and nowhere do we 
meet with the least allusion to them. The system 
tells us what might have taken place, but not what 
really took place. 

The radical fault of the system of the primitively 
written Gospel did not remain unobserved by the more 
logical rationalistic doctors. In order to get rid of it 
Giesler and De Wette supposed a primitive non-written 
Gospel, but propagated orally only by the apostles in 
their catechetical preaching. The teaching of the apos- 
tles, constantly repeated about in the same terms, must 
have become engraved in the memory of the faithful, 
and expressed later on in an almost identical manner 
D. B-33 



5 14 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

by those who undertook to teach them by writ. Par- 
allelly to the apostohc teaching there arose also about 
the Hfe of Jesus local traditions, more or less spread, 
whose formula, similarly fixed in the popular mind, 
passed into one or the other of the evangehcal accounts. 
Hence, the resemblances common to two Gospels only, 
and the divergences of the one or the other. 

This system of explanation gratuitously supposes 
that our Gospels contain about the Hfe of our Lord 
legendary traditions, forming no part of the teaching 
of the apostles. This hypothesis is in contradiction 
with the most formal testimonies of antiquity. Always 
and everywhere the faithful have been persuaded that 
the Gospels taught them only the purest doctrine of 
the apostles. Always and everywhere the apocryphal 
Gospels have been rejected, because they substituted 
to this doctrine traditions without authority, or because 
they gave to the evangelical accounts developments 
of which the apostles had not spoken. Therefore, from 
this side the system of Giesler is inacceptable. It 
becomes, on the contrary, very plausible, when one 
admits that the apostles, accommodating themselves 
in their catechetical preachings to the very different 
surroundings where they made themselves heard, chose 
with preference certain facts of the life of Jesus, and 
varied in the manner of exposing them, according to 
the wants and dispositions of their hearers. 

The Gospel of St. Matthew would be the abridged 
reproduction of the teaching of the apostles such as 
it was addressed to the faithful issued from Judaism; 
the Gospel of St. Luke would be the reflection of the 
apostolic preaching destined for the instruction of the 
converted Gentiles; the Gospel of St. Mark would 



OBJECTIONS. 515 

represent the catechesis of St. Peter to the Christian 
community of Rome, mingled almost equally with the 
Jewish and pagan element. The system, thus modified, 
is actually in favor with several Catholic savants, and 
tends to supplant the system which wishes to explain 
the relations of resemblance of the Synoptic Evangel- 
ists, in admitting that St. Mark has known, and 
employed in his w^ork the Gospel of St. Matthew, and 
that St. Luke has made use of the works of his prede- 
cessors. This latter explanation seems little compati- 
ble with the simplicity of our Evangelists; it does not 
render sufficient account of the verbal divergencies 
which offer themselves all on a sudden in a passage 
which one supposes to be a transcription of a preexist- 
ing copy. On the other hand, if the Gospels give 
to us the formula of the popular preachings of the 
apostles, one may ask with right why we find almost 
nothing of this formula in the numerous discourses of 
the apostles, which "the Book of the Acts has preserved 
to us, nor in the letters which the apostles have written 
to the faithful; why do the apostles, in their discourses 
and letters, quote the text of the Old Testament differ- 
ently than the Evangelists in their accounts; why, in 
addressing themselves to the Jews, have they recourse 
to other Messianic prophecies than St. Matthew in his 
Gospel, etc. Be this as it may with these difficulties, 
the Catholic systems to explain the mutual relations of 
the Synoptics, run against none of the impossibilities 
nor of the historic errors, against which the theories of 
the infidels miserably run aground. 

We can omit here several objections of detail put 
forward by our adversaries against the authenticity of 
the Synoptics, which rather have reference to the 



5l6 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

veracity of these sacred authors. One pretends to point 
out in this book many improbabihties and contradic- 
tions of one Gospel in regard to the other. But these 
improbabihties appear only as such to minds that have 
formed a false idea of the supernatural Providence of 
God in the world, of the role which the miracle exercises 
in the execution of the divine decrees, etc.; the pre- 
tended contradictions, either have only reference about 
minute details, and then they are compatible, if not 
always with inspiration, with the authenticity and the 
subjective veracity of their authors (for even eye wit- 
nesses may be deceived about the minute details of a 
fact, or preserve imperfectly the remembrance thereof) ; 
or these contradictions are pointed out in the substance 
itself of the accounts, and then it is the duty of the 
orthodox critic to seek a reasonable reconciliation be- 
tween the Evangehsts. When, on account of the defect 
of documents arrived to us, criticism is unable to find 
an acceptable reconciliation, it has to confess only its 
ignorance, without that on this account it can question 
the authenticity of the Gospels which is based upon 
irrefragable proofs. In good logic, an insoluble diffi- 
culty is not sufificient to shake a thesis becomingly dem- 
onstrated by the arguments that are proper to it. 



CHAPTER LV. 



AUTHENTICITT OF THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO 
ST. JOHN. 

THE physiognomy of the fourth Gospel is quite 
different from that of the first three. It is an 
apart work, written with a special polemical end, to 
which all is subordinated in the choice of the acts of the 
life of Jesus which are related therein. The author 
wishes to establish the divinity of Jesus against the 
heretical sects who wished to deny this capital dogma. 
Ancient tradition also assigns another end in view to 
this Evangelist; the Synoptics having omitted almost 
entirely the facts of the first two years of the pubhc hfe 
of Jesus, the author of the fourth Gospel proposes to 
supply this silence. 

Whole antiquity is unanimous in proclaiming as 
author of this Gospel the Apostle St. John, the beloved 
disciple of Jesus. One points, out, indeed, in this har- 
mony the discordant voice of a heretical sect, that of 
the Alogeans, but we know that dogmatic reasons alone 
moved them not to acknowledge the hand of an apostle 
in a writing which so neatly affirmed the existence and 
the attributes of the Word of God. Analogous dogmatic 
reasons have pushed modern infidelity to cast a doubt 
on the authenticity of this apostolic document. Since 
one century they have been engaged In, and continue to 
pursue against this truth, a bitter war, whose stake is, 



5l8 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

they say, the dogma of the Divinity of Christ. Conse- 
quently, it is important to put this authenticity in its 
full light. 

I. INTRINSIC ARGUMENTS— FORMAL TESTIMONIES OF 
ANTIQUITY. 

None of these testimonies surpasses that of St. 
Irenseus, bishop of Lyons, born and raised in Asia, 
where he was the disciple of St. Polycarp, he himself a 
disciple of St. John. Behold what this illustrious doc- 
tor tells us: "Then John, the disciple who also rested 
on His bosom, has also brought forth the Gospel, whilst 
staying in Ephesus in Asia " (Hser. iii, i). These words 
are so clear, the teaching is so complete, and of such a 
great authority, that, if we would possess only this sole 
testimony, we would have to hold the authenticity of 
the Gospel of St. John as unquestionable. But we are 
not reduced to this sole testimony, both the East and 
the West are united to corroborate it. The Church of 
Rome makes its thought known to us in the " Frag- 
ment of Muratori," where we read these words: " The 
author of the fourth Gospel is John, one of the disciples. 
As his fellow-disciples and the bishops exhorted him 
(to write), he says to them: From this day on fast with 
me during three days, and we will communicate mu- 
tually to one another that has been revealed to us. In 
that very night it was revealed to Andrew, that John 
should write the whole in his name, and cause his work 
to be revised by all the others." Whatever may be the 
historic value of this narrative, certainly it results from 
the words quoted that, about the year 170 A. D., the 
Church of Rome put out of the question the composi- 
tion of the fourth Gospel by the Apostle John. The 



AUTHENTICITY OF THE GOSPEL. 519 

African Church speaks in its turn through luC mouth 
of TertuUian. This Father of the second century dis- 
tinguishes neatly among the four EvangeHsts two 
apostles, John and Matthew. He afhrms that before 
the appearance of the Gospel of Marcion, another Gos- 
pel makes known to us the incredulity of the brethren 
of the Lord, a detail which is given only by St. John 
(vii, 5). In Egypt we hear, about in the same time, 
Clement of Alexandria, teaching us that " according to 
the tradition of the ancients, John the last Evangelist, 
seeing that in the Gospels of the others were related 
facts concerning the body of Christ, wrote himself, 
under the breath of the Holy Ghost, and at the request 
of his companions, a Spiritual Gospel f'Ap. Euseb." H. 
E. vi, 14). Syria brings us the testimony of St. Theo- 
phus of Antioch, placing St. John among the inspired 
writers and reciting word for word the beginning of his 
Gospel. 

The Clementine Homilies, in the midst of the 
second century, refer to them in terms which indicate 
the high esteem in which this Gospel was already re- 
garded in this epoch. 

Let us add here the testimony of the " Doctrine of 
the Twelve Apostles," know^n only since 1883. Herein 
we do not read textually any passage of the fourth Gos- 
pel, but as in several ancient writings, we can recognize 
in the language of the writer, a reminiscence of St. 
John. Let us quote in particular what the author of 
the Didache says of the Eucharist : " As to the Eucha- 
rist you shall render thanks thus. Eirst for the chalice: 
we render thanks to Thee, our Eather, for the holy 
vine of our servant David which Thou didst make 
known to us through Jesus, Thy Son. To Thee, be 



520 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

glory for ever and ever! For the broken bread: we 
render thanks to Thee, our Father, for the life and the 
science which Thou didst make known to us through 
Jesus, Thy Son. To Thee be glory for ever and ever! 
Like (the grains of) this broken bread were sown on the 
mountains, and have united themselves to form one 
whole, that thus Thy Church may be united from the 
extremities of the earth in Thy kingdom, because to 
Thee belong the glory and power through Jesus Christ 
for ever and ever!" This manner of speaking, which we 
also recover in the act of thanksgiving that ends the 
spiritual banquet, we find almost solely in the Gospel of 
St. John. 

The formal testimonies do not go back beyond the 
second century; we do not need to be astonished at 
this, because St. John wrote only about the end of the 
first century, but, in more remote epochs, we can still 
collect precious indirect testimonies. 

2. INDIRECT TESTIMONIES. 

We find them in the ancient Italic and Syria versions 
which contain the fourth Gospel, according to John, 
and in the quotations of the Fathers. 

St. Ignatius of Antioch, says of the Spirit of God, 
" that it knows whence it comes and whither it goes " ; 
St. John says the same thing of the Holy Ghost (ad 
Philad. 7; Joann. iii, 8); the author of the '' Letter to 
Diogenes," writer of the second century, speaks of the 
Word in the same terms as St. John in his prologue, 
and in the dialogue of Jesus with Nicodemus (Ep. ad 
Dignon. 7, 10); St. Polycarp certainly knew the fourth 
Gospel, because In his letter to the Philippians (vii.), 
he quotes a text from the first Epistle of St. John (iv, 



AUTHENTICITY OF THE GOSPEL. 52 1 

2-3). We know that, according to the avowal of all 
the critics, this epistle is of the same author as the 
fourth Gospel, and, supposing its existence, St. Papias 
also makes use of the first Epistle of St. John ('' Ap. 
Euseb. H. E." iii, 39), therefore, he also knew the fourth 
Gospel. St. Justin quotes the words of Jesus Christ to 
Nicodemus in regard to the necessity of baptism (John 
iii, 5) and evidently makes an allusion to the objection 
which this doctor made to the Saviour (Tryph. 105); he 
reports exactly as St. John and otherwise as the Septu- 
agint the prophecy of Zacharias: ''They wih look at 
the one wdiich they have pierced " (Apol. i, 52). 
Tatian commences his Diatessaron with the prologue 
of St. John. Apollinarius, bishop of Hierapohs, can 
learn only from the fourth EvangeUst that Jesus cele- 
brated the Pasch on the fourteenth day of the moon, 
that His side was pierced upon the cross, and that water 
and blood came forth from the wound (Fragm. Pat. gr. 
V, 1297). 

The quotations of the ancient Gnostics are not less 
striking. BasiHdes says that it is written in the Gospels: 
'' Pie was the true Hght, which enlightened every man 
that Cometh into the world " (Philosoph. 7, 22). Ptol- 
emy quotes, as from the apostle, John i, 3 (Ad. Epiph. 
Hasr. 33). Theodotus quotes John xvii, 11: "Father, 
keep them in m}^ name.'' Heracleon wrote a com- 
mentary on the Gospel of St. John, the fragments of 
which Origen has preserved to us. 

Conclusion. — St. John died about the end of the 
first century. Several of his disciples undoubtedly 
lived until the middle of the second century. Now, 
since the second century, the entire Church possessed 
the fourth Gospel, and attributed it without hesitation 



522 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

and without contestation to this apostle; it was used 
all over as an inspired work. How can one explain this 
phenonomen, if this Gospel, as Rationahsm wishes, went 
forth only in the second century from the pen of a falsi- 
fier? Our adversaries have not even made the attempt 
to explain this; it is absolutely impossible to do so. 

3. INTRINSIC ARGUMENTS. 

The author of the fourth Gospel designates himself, 
without, however, giving his name. It is " the disciple 
whom Jesus loved,'' and this disciple, according to all 
tradition, was no other but St. John. There were in the 
college of the twelve apostles three men preferred by 
the Master — Peter, John and James. Moreover, Peter 
and John appear, in the Synoptic Gospels, frequently 
associated together in divers conjunctures of the life of 
Jesus. The author of the fourth Gospel names almost 
all the less important apostles; Peter plays a great role 
in his writings, he appears therein more than once asso- 
ciated with the beloved disciple of Jesus, but nowhere 
do we find designated by their names John and James, 
his brother. Once there is mention made of the sons 
of Zebedee, in the history of the apparition of the 
Saviour on the shores of Lake Tiberiades. The author 
often speaks of the Precursor, and nowhere does 
he add the surname of Baptist ; he calls him John,' 
without determining any more ; in the Synoptics, only 
the apostle is designated by this name. The anomaly 
explains itself right away when John himself is the nar- 
rator. This narrator is, besides certainly a Jew of Pales- 
tine ; anybody else would have been less acquainted with 
the Jewish customs and historical and geographical de- 
tails. He speaks of Cana in Galilee^ because he knows 



AUTHENTICITY OF THE GOSPEL. 523 

there exists another Cana in the tribe of Aser; he knows 
the exact site of Capharnaum; he knows that from the 
other side of the sea of Tiberiades arise mountains; that 
in this place the sea is only of a width that one can get 
around it on foot in one night, and arrive in the morning 
at Capharnaum; he describes in detail the pool of Beth- 
saida; he knows the fountain of Siloe, and estimates 
exactly the distance from Jerusalem to Bethania; he 
enumerates the great Jewish feasts, assigns the epoch 
when they are celebrated and remarks that the eighth 
day of the Scenopegia was especially solemn. Finally, 
he has been present at the crucifixion of Jesus, and has 
seen with his own eyes the water and the blood flow 
from His pierced side. Is there anything more needed 
to characterize the author, and to make us exclude any 
other person except the Apostle St. John. 

4. OBJECTIONS OF THE RATIONALISTS AGAINST THE 
AUTHENTICITY OF THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. 

One pretends: i. That the author of the fourth Gos- 
pel is not a Jew; 2. That this Gospel contains errors of 
fact which one cannot expect from an eye witness; 3. 
That he is in contradiction with the Synoptics and 
professes other religious doctrines than these; 4. That 
he puts in the mouth of Jesus discourses which Jesus 
has not pronounced; 5. That the day assigned by him 
for the celebration of the last Pasch is not in agreement 
with the tradition of St. John. Let us examine suc- 
cessively these difficulties! 

I. The author of the fourth Gospel always speaks of 
the Jews in the third person, and puts himself in opposi- 
tion with them. Therefore, they say, he was not a 
Jew. One forgets that St. John wrote at Ephesus for 



524 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Christians that had been formerly Gentiles, in an epoch 
when the Jews had lost their nationahty. Besides, 
Jesus speaking to the Jews, does He not say to them: 
" Abraham, your father " (John viii, 56), which did not 
hinder him to Idc Himself from the race of Abraham? 

2. They pretend that the author is deceived in 
placing Bethania beyond the Jordan (i, 28); in speaking 
of a city of Sichar, unknown in the history of Israel (iv, 
5); in calling Caiphas high priest of that year, as if the 
sovereign pontificate had been an annual office, error so 
much more coarse as Caiphas occupied that dignity 
during ten consecutive years. — Answer: Instead of 
Bethania, we must probably read Bethabara. Besides, 
St. John speaks elsewhere explicitly of Bethania in 
Judea, neighboring borough of Jerusalem. Sichar was 
probably a corruption of Sichem, principal city of Sam- 
aria situated at the foot of the sacred mountain of the 
Samaritans. St. John says that Caiphas was high priest 
that year, without saying by that he was this neither 
before nor after. 

3. The adversaries of the Gospel of St. John tax, as 
contradictory, accounts which mutually complete them- 
selves. St. John knew the first three Gospels and sup- 
posed them to be known by his readers. He knew that 
his predecessors did not wish to give a complete 
biography of Jesus, that, on the contrary, each of them 
had chosen and disposed his accounts according to a 
determined plan. The Synoptics had pointed out only 
one voyage of Jesus to Jerusalem; John does not con- 
tradict them when he mentions five of them. He also 
could relate how Jesus, at the beginning of His public 
life, drove out the sellers from the Temple, although 
knowing very well that the Master had done a similar 



AUTHENTICITY OF THE GOSPEL. 525 

thing three years later, accordmg to the Synoptics. 
Besides, it is not impossible that the Synoptics, at the 
occasion of the account of the facts and acts of Jesus in 
the Temple, about the last Pasch of His life, had men- 
tioned, in this place, the act of authority which the 
Master had exercised in the Temple three years pre- 
viously. St. Matthew and St. Mark pay little attention 
to a chronological order; they prefer to follow the logi- 
cal order of facts. Let us remark, moreover, that the\ 
precise duration of the public life of Jesus is not fixed by 
any of the four Evangelists. The Synoptics tell 
nowhere that all what they relate took place in one 
single year, and the fourth Gospel, although it speaks 
of three or four Paschs celebrated by Jesus, does not say 
that He did not celebrate any more after His baptism. 

Rationalism claims that the Jesus of the Synoptics 
is quite a different personage from that which the fourth 
Gospel offers to us. The Master, at the Synoptics, 
is a simple and popular doctor; his teaching is almost 
exclusively a moral one; he proposes it in parables ac- 
cessible to the popular understanding; when they call 
Him Son of God, He imposes silence upon the indiscreet 
tongues. On the contrary, the Christ of John is a 
philosopher, speaking through enigmatic sentences, an 
obscure and subtile dialectician; His teaching is dog- 
matic; always occupied with His own personality, He 
does not cease to inculcate belief in His superior nature. 
Behold what '* criticism " has discovered, and what 
nobody had perceived during nearly nineteen cen- 
turies. Is it a professor of theology that speaks 
thus, when he addresses his scholars and when, getting 
down from his chair, he begins to catechize children or 
country people? The example applies very well to the 



526 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

case that occupies us. The Synoptics show us Jesus 
preaching to rural or commercial peoples of Galilee. 
John relates the disputes of the Saviour with the 
Scribes, the Pharisees and priests of Jerusalem, men in- 
structed in the law and given up to all the subtleties 
of rabbinism. Let us remark, moreover, the differ- 
ence of the end in view the Evangelists proposed to 
themselves. The Synoptics tried to make Jesus to be 
known as the Messiah, the great deliverer of Israel and 
of all the nations. John found himself in the presence 
of Gnostic dogmatizers, who attacked the divine charac- 
ter of the Saviour, he desired to oppose to them the 
affirmation and the demonstration which Jesus Himself 
gave of His divinity. 

4. Finally, let us say that these discourses of Jesus 
must have made a deep impression upon the well- 
beloved disciple, who had rested on the bosom of the 
Saviour. Hence, there is nothing astonishing that 
these discourses have remained more present to his 
mind, dearer to his heart, and that he, in an opportune 
time, did communicate them by writing to the Church. 
When one repHes that these discourses are too long, 
that no apostle could retain them and reproduce them 
after so many years, we can answer, that the Evangelist 
gives to us the meaning of the words of the Lord, and 
the substance of His discourses, rather than the develop- 
ment which, the Master gave to them. No great effort 
of memory was needed, in order that the beloved disciple 
of Jesus could thus reproduce discourses to which dialog- 
ism gave sufficient relief and vivacity. Besides, we have 
to suppose that, in his preachings and catechetical in- 
structions, the apostle had frequently commented on 
these divine words, and that he had become quite 



AUTHENTICITY OF THE GOSPEL. 527 

familiar with them. Finally, when sometimes the 
memory of the writer was wanting in exactitude, he was 
guided by the Holy Ghost who reminded him on every- 
thing what the Master had said (John xiv, 26). 

5. The fifth objection is drawn from the famous dis- 
pute that arose in the second century between Pope 
St. Victor and some bishops of Asia, in regard to the 
day of the celebration of Easter. Polycarp and his fol- 
lowers appealed to the tradition of St. John, to uphold 
their side to keep the feast on the fourteenth day of 
the month of Nisan. Now, say they, the fourth Gospel 
places the Last Supper of Jesus on the thirteenth day 
of this month. We can give a twofold answer. First, 
St. John might very well have adopted for the feast of 
the Pasch the fourteenth Nisan, even then, if he would 
have placed, in his Gospel, the Last Supper on the thir- 
teenth. Then, can we deny the supposition of our 
adversaries. For it is much more probable that St. 
John places, in his account, the Last Supper on the 
evening of the fourteenth Nisan, according to the sense 
naturally presented by the narratives of the Synoptics. 
It is not here the place to enter into details of this 
question, one of the most complicated for the interpre- 
ters of the Gospels. 

All these objections are drawn from elements intrin- 
sical of the book itself. This is the usual proceeding 
of infidel criticism. It also has tried its strength on 
the ground of intrinsical testimonies. Incapable to 
bring forth against the authenticity of the fourth Gospel 
one single word of testimonies from antiquity, it has 
invoked their silence, to maintain -that the apostle John 
had never sojourned in Asia. Otherwise, it says, Igna- 
tius of Antioch, in his letters to the churches of Asia, 



52S DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

would not have omitted to invoke, to reprimand them, 
the authority of this apostle. Now, St. John is men- 
tioned nowhere therein. Paul, on the contrary, is 
named in the letter to the Ephesians. We answer: It 
is true that one might expect a similar mention in the 
letters of Ignatius, but one does not prove that we 
absolutely ought to find therein any mention. St. Paul 
had, as Ignatius, passed through Ephesus to go to 
martyrdom; and under this title his remembrance is 
invoked; St. John had not passed through this city, 
hence he must not, in this place of the letter, be asso- 
ciated with St. Paul. St. Polycarp in his letter left to 
us, speaks also of St. Paul, without mentioning St. John; 
but he writes to the Church of the Philippians, which 
had been founded by St. Paul, and which St. John never 
visited. 



• CHAPTER LVL 



INTEGRITT OF THE GOSPELS. 

WHEN one admits, as we have shown in the pre- 
ceding chapters, the authenticity of the four 
Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, one can 
easily deduct from this their integral transmission, with- 
out substantial alteration. 

In the first place, it seems that no alteration could 
have taken place whilst the apostles were alive. For if 
notable alterations would have taken place in their work, 
the apostles, dispersed all over the civilized world, would 
not have ignored this, and, knowing it, would not have 
tolerated it in silence. Besides, in this epoch, every 
corruption would have been right away established by 
the comparison of the autographs still existing. 
Neither could a corruption of the text have been ex- 
ecuted after the death of the apostles, at the beginning 
of the second century. For, according to the testi- 
mony of Tertullian (Prax. 36), the autographs of the 
apostolic writings were still in existence at the begin- 
ning of the third century. In the second century, as 
we know through St. Justin (Apol. ad Ant. 65), the 
Gospels were publicly read during the celebration of 
the Liturgy. The text thereof became, so to say, no- 
torious to the faithful, and all occult corruption was 
then impossible. Already in the second century they 
had composed and spread both the Latin and Syriac 
D. B.— 34 (529) 



530 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

versions of the Gospels, in which we find exactly our 
entire text. Finall}^ since this epoch, there are in the 
writings of the Fathers a great number of quotations 
of the Gospels; all these quotations are found in our 
actual copies. St. Irenseus, among others, gives the 
analysis of the whole contents of the Gospel of St. 
Luke. Ever3^thing therein corresponds exactly with 
our actual text. Since the third and fourth centuries 
the quotations from the Gospel are abounding at the 
Fathers of the Ghurch, and they are in conformity 
with our texts. In the fourth century were drawn up 
our most ancient manuscripts of the Gospels, which 
are, in the present hour, the richest treasures of our 
large libraries; once m.ore, these precious documents 
conspire to testify in favor of the integral preservation 
of our Gospels. To prove our assertion, it is sufficient 
to consult one of the critical editions of the New Testa- 
ment, wherein are consigned all the different readings 
of the text, and of which the most famous are those 
of Tischendorf and of Tregelles. It would be senseless 
to wish to explain this harmony in saying that in the 
fourth century the corrupted text had become domi- 
nant. In fact, this would suppose that the Fathers and 
the copyists of the third and fourth centuries had all 
corrupted copies, and all corrupted in the same manner; 
and that moreover, there has not been left any trace of 
the dift'erent copies, corrupted or not corrupted, in any 
other way, although, in the third and second centuries, 
the evangelical text had been copied, translated and 
quoted constantly and everywhere in the Church. Even 
we would have to suppose that already in the time of St. 
Augustine, every trace of a different text had dis- 
appeared. Behold, indeed, the words of the holy 



INTEGRITY OF THE GOSPELS. 53 1 

doctor: " There cannot go forth from their mouth any- 
thing more impudent, or, to use more lenient terms, 
anything more thoughtless, anything weaker, than the 
afftrmation saying that our divine Writings have been 
corrupted, because they cannot prove this by any of 
the manuscripts whose existence goes back to such 
recent recollections " (" Dentil, cred." 3, 7). 

All we come to tell has reference to the substantial 
integrity of our Gospels. It w^ould remain established 
even if criticism would succeed in proving the existence 
of some detailed interpolations. They have attempted 
this proof. To believe them, we would have to regard 
as apocryphal: i. The first two chapters of St. Matthew; 

2. The conclusion of the Gospel of St. Mark (xvi, 9-20); 

3. The history of the bloody sweat of Jesus in the 
Garden of Olives (Luke xxii, 43-44); 4- The mention 
of the angel descending into the pool of Bethsaida 
(John V, 4); 5. The history of the adulterous woman 
(John vii, 53; viii, 11); 6. The last chapter of the Gospel 
of St. John. Let us briefly examine these contested 
places: 

I. One has been led to ciuestion the apostolic pro- 
duction of the first two chapters of St. Matthew, on 
account of the difficulty one experiences in reconciling 
the accounts with other passages of the Bible. One 
was wrong, as we shall see. The first two chapters of 
the Gospel of St. Matthew are found in all the manu- 
scripts and in all the ancient versions. There are only 
a few manuscripts which place the genealogy of Christ 
at the beginning of the book, outside the historical 
series of facts. The ancient Fathers quoted texts from 
these chapters. The pagan philosopher Celsus cites 
them when he treats on the double genealogy, and on 



532 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

the adoration of the Magi. JuHus Africanus published 
in the third century a dissertation on the harmony 
between the two genealogies. 

2. Two manuscripts of the first order, that of Sinai 
and that of the Vatican, end the last chapter of St. Mark 
with the eight verse instead with the twentieth verse. 
The other codices unciales add the other twelve verses. 
All the manuscripts, even the Syriac evangelical frag- 
ments published by Cureton, have the conclusion com- 
plete. The minusculoe manuscripts have it also, some 
with a marginal note, saying that the final passage is 
wanting in the ancient copies and in the most exact 
{accuratioribus). The Fathers are greatly in favor of 
it. It is accepted by Irenseus, Aphraatus, Augustine, 
Cesarius of Constantinople, the so-called Synopsis of 
Athanasius, Eusebius and Jerome take notice of the di- 
vergence of the manuscripts. Victor of Antioch knew of 
the divergence, and nevertheless admits the entire text. 
Dionysius of Alexander says in his canonical letter 
that the Alexandrians, according to Matthew, broke 
the fast of Lent in the evening of Holy Saturday (Mat. 
xxviii, i), whilst at Rome, according to Mark (xvi, 9), 
they fasted till in the morning of the next day. Is it, 
perhaps, this apparent contradiction that caused to sus- 
pect in the East the authenticity of the last words of 
Mark? This conjecture seems quite well founded; it 
would render account of all the different readings of 
the manuscripts in this place. 

Dr. Davidson who upholds in England all the opin- 
ions of the negative criticism and who, consequently, 
rejects the authenticity of the last twelve verses 
of St. Mark, sets forth the reasons in favor of the 
authenticity in the following manner: '' It is difificult to 



INTEGRITY OF THE GOSPELS. 533 

decide among the contradictory proofs. The fact that 
Irenaeus had this paragraph before his eyes in his copy 
of the Gospel contributes against the authority of the 
numerous manuscripts which omit it. Beside the tes- 
timony of Irenseus on verse ten we liave a still more an- 
cient testimony for the verses fifteen to nineteen in the 
acts of Pilate, incorporated in the Gospel of Nicodemus. 
However, the relations of the now known Acts with the 
primitive work which Justin and TertuUian had in 
hands are too uncertain to furnish a solid argument. 
Celsus also shows that he knew this conclusion when he 
says: " Who has seen this? A mad woman, as you say," 
making allusion to Mary Magdalene, to whom Jesus 
had appeared first, and from whom He had chased seven 
demons. The language certainly differs from that of 
the rest of the Gospel, but this difference may be ex- 
plained by the usage of another' source, which the 
Evangelist chose here rather than St. Matthew. . . . 
It is difficult to beheve that the writer could stop at 
the w^ords timebant enimy *'' for they were afraid." The 
reason why this conclusion has been omitted in many 
copies is insinuated by St. Jerome, Eusebius,^ etc." 

Therefore, whatever may be the differences of the 
manuscripts, there are excellent and plenty of sufficient 
proofs in favor of the conclusion of the Gospel of St. 
Mark. 

3. The tv/o verses of St. Luke which relate the 
bloody sweat of Jesus are equally omitted in two 
manuscripts of first value, the Alexandrian (A) and the 
Vatican (B), but they are in the Sinatic, and in all the 
other majusculce, except one. However, in many 



^ S. Davidson, " Introduction to the New Testament," vol. i, 

P- 575- 



534 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

codices, the passage is pointed out by a mark or aster- 
isk. St. Ambrose and St. Cyrillus of Alexandria do not 
give any commentary, St. Hilary is undecided, St. 
Jerome formerly admits the verses, by remarking " that 
they are found in some copies." A false fear of scandal 
might have caused the suppression of this history in the 
public readings, and thereby in copies destined for this 
reading. We know through St. Epiphanius that they 
acted in this v^ay with a passage where there is question 
of the tears of the Savior. 

4. We ignore why many manuscripts omit the 
verse of the angel of Bethsaida. The context, however, 
claims it : without this we cannot understand the words 
of the paralytic (v, 7): " Sir, I have no man, when the 
water is troubled, to put me into the pond. For, 
whilst I am coming, another goeth down before me." 
The Fathers of the different parts of the Church, Cyril- 
lus of Alexandria, Chrysostom, Tertullian, Augustine, 
know and accept the verse. If it were not authentic 
how could one explain this harmony of the Fathers? 

5. The most contested passage of the Gospel of St. 
John is the history of the adulterous woman. Many 
critics reject it as an interpolation, because we do not 
read it in a great number of important manuscripts, 
such as the Codex Sinaiticus, the Codex Vaticanus, the 
Codex Alexandrinus, and the Codex Regius of Paris, 
which are from the fourth or fifth centuries, and still 
many others. It is also wanting in the most of the 
versions, such as the Syriac of Cureton, the Peschito 
and the translation of Philomenus; in the Gothic ver- 
sion of Ulfilas, in the greater part of the Coptic manu- 
scripts, and in the best manuscripts of the Italic. The 
Greek Fathers who have commented on the Gospel of 



INTEGRITY OF THE GOSPELS. 535 

St. John omit this passage in their commentary: Ori- 
gen, Apohinarius, Theodore of Mopsuesta, St. Cyril 
of Alexandria, St. John Chrysostom, St. Basil, etc. 
Among the Latin Fathers, TertuUian and St. Cyprian 
appear to have known it. Finally, the style of this 
portion differs from the style of St. John; we read, 
for instance, " all the people," instead of " multitude," 
etc., and is connected only with difficulty to what 
precedes and follows. 

We have to admit that all these arguments have 
some weight; however, they are not sufficient to reject 
the authenticity of this evangelical passage. Several 
ancient manuscripts contain it, among others the man- 
uscript of D. of Cambridge, which is only of the sixth 
century, it is true, 1jut represents much more ancient 
copies, which we can make go back to the second cen- 
tury. We find it also in more than three hundred minu- 
sculae manuscripts. Six Evangeliaries and other manu- 
scripts indicate that we must read it on all the feasts 
of St. Pelagia, St. Theodora, St.'Eudoxia and of St 
Alary of Egypt. As to the versions, the Latin Vulgate, 
the Arab, Ethiopian, Slavonic, Anglo-Saxon transla- 
tions have the history of the adulterous Vv-oman, as well 
as the most of the Armenian manuscripts. The Apos- 
tolic Constitutions quote it in the third century, as does 
also the Synopsis of the Scripture which carries the 
name of St.Athanasius; St. Pacian in the fourth century; 
St. Ambrose, St. Augustine and many others. As to 
the Greek Fathers and writers who do not sneak there- 
of: Origen, Theodore of Mopseustia and St. John Chry- 
sostom, we must observe that the eighteenth volume of 
the commentaries of St. John by Origen, wherein this 
controverted passage should be found, is lost; and, 



536 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

moreover, we possess very incomplete fragments of the 
exegetical explanations of Theodore of Mopsuestia and 
of Apollinarius. St. John Chrysostom has not explained 
the fourth Gospel in a consecutive manner. No Greek 
Father positively rejects the passage. Euthymius, 
however, appears to be inclined to do so. The silence 
of St. Basil, of Tertullian and of St. Cyprian proves 
nothing, because they have not made any explanation 
of St. John. 

As to the intrinsic arguments alleged against this 
account, they are far from being conclusive. Undoubt- 
edly we read in this passage some words which we do 
not read elsewhere in the fourth Gospel; but it is the 
same in several other chapters; the style is in reality that 
of St. John, and it is false, moreover, that the episode 
does not belong to the place where it is found, as is ad- 
mitted by the rationalistic Hilgenfeld: '' This narrative 
cannot be separated from the context," he says. When 
one suppresses it, we cannot explain the Word of Jesus: 
" I judge not any man (viii, 15) and one cannot bring 
forth neither any reason for his presence in the Tem- 
ple " (20). 

6. St. John, they say, evidently ends his account with 
the twentieth chapter. Chapter twenty-one has been 
added by a foreign hand. — But why could not St. John 
himself, after having ended his work, add an appendix, 
which appeared useful to him? Should he have 
changed on this account the first authorship of the 
chapter by which he had at first the intention to finish? 
It is certain, according to the documents of antiquity, 
that the Gospel of St. John did never exist in the 
Church without this last chapter. Had it been even 
added by the disciples of this apostle to the work of 



VERACITY OF THE GOSPELS. 53/ 

their master, we would have to accept it as an inspired 
writing. But no decisive reasons hinder us to regard 
it as having proceeded entirely from the pen of the 
Evangelist. 



CHAPTER LVII. 



VERACITT OF THE GOSPELS. 

THE veracity of the Gospels proves itself by the fol- 
lowing considerations. The veracity of a testi- 
mony is evident, when the testimonies offer all the 
desired guarantee as to the knowledge of the facts 
which they attest, and as to the probity which assures 
the sincerity of their account. The proof is complete 
when one can establish that, even had it been their desire 
to deceive their readers, this has been impossible for 
them. Now, all these guarantees exist from the part 
of the EvangeHsts. 

The Evangelists had an exact knowledge of the facts 
which they relate. Two among them, St. Matthew 
and St. John, were apostles; as such they had lived dur- 
ing three years in intimacy with Jesus; they had been 
eye witnesses of the most of the events of the public 
life of their Master; as to the other facts of this time, 
they received the accounts from those of their col- 
leagues who had been witnesses of them; finally, the 
facts of which no apostle had been witness, they knew 
them all through the testimony of persons worthy of be- 
lief who had been minp-led with them, namely, the holy 
women, John the Baptist, Nicodemus, the Blessed 



538 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Virgin, etc. St. Mark, according to an incontestable 
tradition, received his teaching from St. Peter; St. Luke 
himself tells us in his prologue, that he gathered his in- 
formation with the greatest care from those who were 
since the beginning eye witnesses, and from those who 
exercised the ministering of the Word. The latter 
words seem to refer especially to St. Paul who also saw 
the Lord, and received immediate revelations from Him. 
Testimonies so well informed might, for the most, be 
deceived in regard to some minute details, but indiffer- 
ent as to the substance of the facts. If, moreover, as 
it is the case here, they have written under the inspira- 
tion of the Holy Ghost, they must have been guarded 
against all error. Let us note, however, that, the pres- 
ent discussion belonging to the preambles of faith, we 
must make abstraction from inspiration, and consider 
the Gospels only as historic documents. 

The rationalistic criticism refuses to subscribe to 
these conclusions. AA\ the testimonies of the evangel- 
ical facts were, they say, common people without in- 
struction, simple and credulous, filled with prejudices 
as to the character of the Messiah, disposed beforehand 
to explain in a supernatural sense all the somewhat 
ordinary actions of their Master, whom they had taken 
for the Messiah. 

The objection would have some value, if the testi- 
mony of the Evangelists, and of those Avho related to 
them what they had seen and heard, had a bearing on 
the explanation of the causes of these astonishing facts. 
It disappears when they attack the testimony bearing 
on the existence of these facts. The evangelical facts 
in question fall under the senses: to establish their exist- 
ence with certitude, it is sufficient that the testimonies 



VERACITY OF THE GOSPELS. " 539 

were neither deaf nor blind. Let us show this by an 
example. St. Matthew, St. Peter and St. John are with 
their Master in a desert place; a crowd of peoples has 
followed thither. Jesus puts among their hands five 
loaves of bread and two small fishes; with this slender 
provision they pass through groups each composed 
of five thousand persons; they behold the loaves of 
bread and fishes multiplying themselves among their 
hands. Five thousand men eat at will from these 
nourishments, which are distributed to them by the 
apostles; and, when they are satiated, the latter gather 
twelve baskets of what was left of this prodigious festi- 
val. Now, we ask, if the most subtile of the philoso- 
phers, and the most exacting of the Academicians had 
been present at this spectacle, would they have seen and 
established something else but these three men of the 
people, from whom we hold the threefold narrative of 
the miracle? Some adept of modern science might, 
perhaps, set up the hypothesis that Jesus had hypno- 
tised His apostles, and that the latter, acting under the 
power of suggestion, imagined to perform all these acts 
among a crowd equally imaginary. But, had it been 
thus, the apostles, in leaving their state of hypnotism, 
would have remembered nothing of what they had done 
under the influence of the hallucination; and how could 
Jesus, on the next day, recall to the mind of the Caphar- 
naites the prodigy which He had wrought in their 
favor? Infidel science may make every effort to deny 
the supernatural, it will never succeed in showing that, 
for this miracle and so many others equally easy to 
establish, the testimony of the apostles is less accept- 
able than that of the most cautious criticism. It is, 
therefore, manifest that the Evangelists are, in general, 



540 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

witnesses well informed about the events which they 
relate. As to the causes of these events, generally 
they do not seek to give an explanation of them; but 
content themselves in saying that Jesus Himself 
appealed to His works to confirm His divine mission. 

The sincerity of the Evangelists is not less than 
their competency. This results from the moral qual- 
ities of the writers. They were simple and naive men, 
irreproachable in their conduct, who show themselves 
at every occasion full of candor and frankness. The 
spirit of man is made for truth; this is a moral law which 
he betrays only when he has an interest in lying. Now, 
what interest could the Evangelists have to deceive us 
in regard to the life and actions of their Divine Master? 
When, in their eyes, the facts which they relate were 
false, Jesus was not for them the Messiah, the Son of 
God; He was only a miserable impostor who had them 
shamefully seduced, and from whom they had nothing 
any more to expect. Besides, they beheld the power- 
ful of the century breaking loose all over against the 
new doctrine and against its followers; hence, the lie 
could draw upon them only vexations and misfortunes 
of all kinds; and after a miserable Hfe ended, perhaps 
am.ong the most atrocious torments, the}^ could expect 
only an eternity of punishment as price for their deceit. 
Except to be insane, man does not tell lies in similar 
conditions. 

But let us admit for a moment that the Evangelists, 
contrary to all the laws that rule the free acts of men, 
had the desire to deceive their readers, it would have 
been impossible for them to execute their design; the 
lie would have been known very quickly. Indeed, let 
us not forget that the Evangelists are writers contem- 



VERACITY OF THE GOSPELS. 54I 

porary of the evepxts which they relate; these events are 
facts of the greatest importance, which took place, for 
the most in public, before an audience partly sympa- 
thetic, partly hostile to the hero of the accounts. Mighty 
crowds heard the discourses of Jesus and saw His 
miracles. If, however, nobody had heard anything, 
seen anything similar, would the pretended witnesses 
not have discovered the imposture right away? From 
the time they would have been convinced of the 
lie, it would have been done forever with the belief in 
the Gospels. Let us remark, moreover, that, in the 
moment of the drawing up of the Gospels, the apostles 
liad already preached in many places the discourses, 
the miracles of Christ, and especially His resurrection; 
all this had passed into the belief of the faithful. The 
narratives of the Evangelists could, therefore, be ac- 
cepted only under the condition to be in accord with 
the preaching of the apostles. Consequently, if there 
had been fraud on their part, all the apostles would 
have been accomplices to this; all would have been 
agreed to tell a He, and to lie in the same manner. Is 
it credible that so many men, otherwise recommend- 
able on account of the holiness of their lives, had con- 
sented to such a criminal conspiracy, with such a stub- 
bornness that all prefer to die in torments than to 
give the lie to their claims? Then again: had their 
hypocritical perversity even gone that far, how would 
they have succeeded by their coarse lies to persuade the 
Jews and Gentiles to renounce all that they had 
believed and practiced thus far, and to give credence 
to a new doctrine, oftering to the mind unfathomable 
mysteries, and to the heart a moral opposed to all the 
instincts of sensual nature? Protests arose, it is true, 



542 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

in the bosom of Judaism and Paganism; but how were 
they produced? The magistrates of Israel prohibited 
to the apostles to preach in the name of Jesus of 
Nazareth; they w4sh to smother the voice of the wit- 
nesses, they do not even attempt to refute their words; 
the Gentiles turn the crucified Master into ridicule, 
and show a great despise towards His disciples; they 
come too late to throw doubt on the reality of the 
evangelical facts. 

Let us conclude from all this that, if the evangelical 
facts were false, it would be the greatest of all miracles 
that the whole world had accepted them as true, and 
was resigned to conform its conduct to them, to bring 
the hardest sacrifices of both the intelHgence and the 
heart. 

Quite occupied to place in full light the impossibil- 
ity of fraud of the Evangelists, we have said nothing of 
the seal of sincerity which these writers have imprinted 
upon their work. Never did a man of good faith, were 
he even a stranger or enemy to our belief, read our 
Gospels, without being profoundly impressed with the 
air of candor and truth which these wonderful books 
breathe. Here is no affection of human eloquence, 
no word of exaggeration in the accounts; nothing that 
has a taste of hatred, flattery and desire to please; all 
over the simplicity of the narrator, who has no other 
preoccupation but to communicate to others the 
things which he has learned. They do not conceal 
either the lowness of their origin or the uprightness 
of their ideas, they equally report the rebukes received 
from their Master, and the flattering words which He 
addressed to them. The most surprising facts are de- 
scribed without admiration; the most mijust and most 



VERACITY OF THE GOSPELS. 543 

cruel treatments inflicted upon their Master are re- 
ported without any expression of indignation. They 
take no precaution to be beHeved upon their word. St. 
John himself gives as supreme argum.ent of the truth he 
advances, the assurance that he has been present, and 
that he tells the truth. Most often they insert into 
their accounts the most minute circumstances of time, 
place and persons with a tone of indifference which 
shows that they are fully assured that they will not be 
contradicted. Finally, among the things which they 
report, there are some so elevated, so mysterious, that 
the genius of the greatest philosophers could not im- 
agine them, for example, the discourses of Jesus given 
by St. John. How could the Hmited mind of some 
common peoples have invented such sublime oracles? 

OBJECTIONS. 

Antichristian incredulity hardly occupies itself 
with the arguments we have brought forward in favor 
of the veracity of the Gospels. They go even so far as 
to avow that, if the authenticity of the Gospels were 
demonstrated, one ought, consequently, to admit their 
veracity. They retrench behind the supposition that 
these books are a kind of unconscious and impersonal 
work and, consequently, have not, from the side of their 
authors any title to our belief. Under cover of this 
arbitrary supposition they beUeve that all is permitted 
to them in regard to these writings. They refuse to 
treat them as one treats the profane historical works. 
Also, as soon as the least difficulty arises to bring into 
accord the writings of the Gospels with the accounts 
of some profane historian, were it the most obscure 



544 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

and the least exact, it is always tht Gospel that is de- 
ceived, or which deceives its readers; all that, in the 
various Evangelists, has the air to contradict itself, is 
right away declared as irreconcilable; all that, from the 
rationalistic point of view, appears improbable, is pro- 
claimed fabulous. Such or such a prodigy, related by 
its sacred authors, is, they say, unworthy of God; such 
other one is manifestly invented to render the account 
acceptable, etc. It would be too long and too tedious 
to inquire about all the places of the Gospels thus taxed 
with error by the rationalistic criticism, and to discuss 
the often futile arguments upon which one pretends to 
support his accusations. Many of these objections 
disappear by themselves, as soon as one acknowledges 
the Gospels as the authentic work of the apostles and 
their disciples; others have the reason of being only 
in the bad faith and partisan spirit of those who formu- 
late them: a little good will in regard to the sacred 
authors is sufficient to dispel the clouds heaped up at 
pleasure. 

We have only to occupy ourselves here with certain 
famous passages whose veracity has been attacked with 
some appearance of right, and which present serious 
difficulties even to a loyal exegetist. 

I. THE DOUBLE GENEALOGY OF OUR LORD. 

Among all the divergences of the Gospels, there is 
especially one that is very notable, namely, that of the 
two genealogies of Jesus as given by St. Matthew and 
St. Luke. The most ancient ecclesiastical authors 
occupied themselves with this divergence; the contem- 
porary infidels are happy over it. The first explained 
the difference of the two genealogical tables; the second 



VERACITY OF THE GOSPELS. 545 

declare them irreconcilable. " When one reflects," 
says Strauss, '' on the insurmountable difficulties in 
which all the attempts at reconciliation unavoidably 
involved themselves, one will despair with more liberal 
commentators, of the possibiUty to establish the har- 
mony between the two genealogies, and one has to 
admit the reciprocal contradiction." Behold, accord- 
ing to this infidel critic, in w4iat the disaccord consists: 

" From David to Joseph, Luke counts forty-one 
generations, and Matthew only twenty-six. But the 
principal difficulty is that Luke gives to Jesus, for an- 
cestors, for the most, quite other individuals than those 
which Matthew gives to him. It is not that they are 
not in accord to reduce the descent of Jesus through 
Joseph to David and to Abraham; it is not that they 
are not in accord also in the generations from Abraham 
until David, and later in the two names of Salathiel and 
Zorobabel; but the really desperate point is, that from 
David to the foster-father of Jesus, quite different names 
are found in Luke and in Matthew. According to 
Matthew, the father of Joseph was called Jacob; accord- 
ing to Luke, Eli. According to Matthew, the son of 
David, through whom Joseph descended from this king, 
was Solomon; according to Luke, Nathan. Hence, 
the genealogical tree of Matthew descends through the 
known royal line; that of Luke by an unknown collateral 
line. These two lines concur only in Salathiel and 
Zorobabel, so, however, that right away they differ 
about the father of Salathiel and about the son of Zoro- 
babel." ^ 

Such is the difficulty and discord. " This is," con- 
cludes Strauss, '' a complete contradiction." But the 

^ D. Strauss, ** Leben Jesu," vol. i, p. 153-154. 
D- B.-35 



546 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

infidels not only pretend that the two genealogies of 
the Gospels contradict themselves, also several among 
them maintain that both are manufactured and false 
documents. This is what, after the example of Strauss, 
Renan affirms. He says: "The inexactitude and con- 
tradictions of the genealogies tend to believe that they 
are the result of a popular labor. . . . The gen- 
ealogy which we read in the Gospel called according to 
Matthew is certainly not the work of the author of this 
Gospel. He took it from an anterior document. . . . 
The tower of the genealogy of Matthew is Hebrew; 
the transcription of the proper names are not those of 
the Septuagint. . . . What is certain is, that this 
labor of genealogies was not executed with much unity 
or authority; for tw^o quite discordant systems to 
connect Joseph with the last personages known of the 
Davidic line have arrived to us. It is not impossible 
that the name of the father and of the high priest of 
Joseph were known. The rest, from Zorobabel to 
Joseph is manufactured. As since the Captivity, the 
biblical writings furnish no longer any chronology, the 
author believes the space of time shorter than it is in 
reality, and puts too few steps in it. Luke even puts 
less therein. In general, the genealogy of Luke is the 
best studied. It appears that he seeks to correct that 
of Matthew according to his own views. "^ 

All these affirmations of Renan, all these " it ap- 
pears " are only pure hypotheses without the least 
foundation, except that in order to find fault with the 
Gospel. Even were we to admit that the two genealo- 
gies were irreconcilable, in good logic, it would follow 
only that one of them is not exact, not that both are 

' E. Renan, " Les Evangiles," pp. 186-187. 



VERACITY OF THE GOSPELS. 547 

false. The only thing true in the observations of the 
critics, is that there are omissions in the evangelical 
lists, but this is neither a new discovery — one has re- 
marked these breaks at all times — nor an argument 
against their authenticity or their credibility, for the 
Hebrew historians did not beHeve themselves obUged 
at all to give in their catalogues all the names without 
exception. 

The infidels try to deny the historical character of 
the evangelical genealogies, in saying, as Strauss does, 
" that it is very improbable that after the perturbations 
of the Exile, and of the times which followed, the 
obscure family of Joseph had preserved genealogies 
which ascended so far back." The infidel critic does 
not dare to say that it is impossible, but he draws the 
same conclusions as if he had established the impossi- 
bility. In order to make us believe that it is improba- 
ble, he treats as obscure the family of Joseph which 
descended from the kings of Juda ! Undoubtedly, it 
had fallen from its ancient grandeur, but it must have 
held, nevertheless, to the preservation of its titles of 
nobility; the whole Biblical history shows us with what 
care the Jews preserved their genealogies. After the 
Captivity, since the return into Judea, Zorobabel 
occupies himself with genealogies.^ Nehemias does 
the same.^ The Books of Tobias, Esther, Judith, of 
the Machabees, furnish the proof of the care with which 
each guarded its genealogical tables.^ The history of 
the census which took place in Judea at the epoch of 

^ I Par. ix; 2 Esd, xi ; cf. i Par. iii, 19; 2 Esd, vii, 5, xii. 
2 2 Esd. vii, 5; xii, 26; cf. i Esd. ii ; 2 Esd. vii; xii, 22; i Par. 
iii. 

^ Tob. i, I ; Judith, viii, i; I Mach. ii, 1-5; viii, 17; xiv. 29. 



548 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

the birth of Jesus, what is said of Zacharias, of EHsabeth 
his wife, of Anna, daughter of Phanuel, are so many 
proofs of the same fact. Besides, the testimonies of the 
New Testament, Josephus, in the beginning of his 
" Life," makes known from w^hom he descended, and 
ends in saying: ''Thus I have traced my genealogy as 
1 have found it marked in the pubHc tables." 

The two evangelical lists, therefore, might have 
been drawn from authentic documents. It is true that 
they differ from one another, but they are not at all un- 
reconcilable. One cannot assert positively, what the true 
solution of the difficulty is, because, as in many other 
facts of antiquity, the documents are wanting. How- 
ever, to any mind, devoid of prejudice, the explanation 
which the Fathers of the Church have given, are suffi- 
cient evidence that St. Matthew and St. Luke, who 
show themselves otherwise well instructed and worthy 
of belief, are no less so in the matter of these gene- 
alogies. These explanations reduce themselves to two 
principal ones; the first of which is: 

" How can it be that Joseph is at the same time the 
son of Jacob and the son of EH, that he descends at the 
same time from David through Solomon and the kings 
(as St. Matthew says) and through Nathan and a branch 
which never has reigned (as St. Luke says)? The 
answer is readily given. If we had two genealogies of 
the second African, the one could give us the gene- 
alogy of the Scipions, the other that of the Emilians, 
both would be not less historical on account of this: 
the author of the one would be the genealogist of the 
natural father, the author of the other, of the adopted 
father of the heroes. It is thus that St. Augustine had 
already the idea to take the Jacob of Matthew for the 



VERACITY OF THE GOSPELS. 549 

natural father, the Eli of Luke for the adopted father 
of Joseph. And in order to prevent the extinction of 
the families, the Mosaic law prescribed that, when a 
husband came to die without children, but had a 
brother living the widow married this brother, and 
the first born of the widow and of the brother was in- 
scribed to descend from the dead. A predecessor of 
St. Augustine, Julius Africanus, endeavored to reconcile 
the divergence in the two genealogies by supposing that 
the mother of Joseph married at first Eli, from whom 
she had no children, then, after the death of Eli, she 
married his brother Jacob, to whom she gave Joseph. 
From this it would follow that Matthew would be right 
in saying that Jacob had engendered Joseph of whom 
he was the natural father, and that Luke was not 
wrong to call Joseph son of Eli, because Joseph, in 
virtue of the law, had to be inscribed under the name 
of Eli." 

The one who speaks thus and who exposes this ex- 
planation, is Strauss himself, in his ''Neues Leben Jesu." 
We do not need to add that he does not consider it 
tenable. Imbued with a partisan spirit, he accepts 
nothing that favors the truthfulness of the Gospels, 
and the worst pretexts furnish sufKciently good grounds 
for him to find fault with the sacred writers. But 
in spite of what he says, he is obliged to agree that it 
can be admitted. '' This is very ingenious, but not 
impossible," he says. We now come to the second 
explanation, also made by Strauss: 

" One believes, lately," he says, '' to be able to solve 
the difficulty in a much more simple way : it is pretended 
that we have, in one of the Evangelists, the genealogy of 
Joseph, and in the other that of Mary, and consequently 



550 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

the divergence of the two genealogies is not a contra- 
diction. . . . The opinion that Mary also belonged 
to the race of David is already very ancient. 
The opinion which promptly prevailed was that Mary 
descended from David. Several apocryphals express 
themselves in this sense; it is the same with Justin the 
Martyr, who says that the Virgin was born of the race 
of David, of Jacob, of Isaac, of Abraham, an assertion 
according to which one could even believe that he has 
referred to Mary one of our genealogical tables, which 
descend equally through David until x\braham. 
The genealogy in Luke, iii, 23, would say: either Jesus 
was, conformably to the common opinion, son of 
Joseph, who himself, was a stepson of Eli, father of 
Mary, or Jesus was, as one believed, son of Joseph 
and by Mary grandson of Eli. . . . One cannot 
deny . . . that the genitive in Luke, being a case 
of dependence is not susceptible to signify all kinds 
of kindred, and consequently, that of son-in-law or 
grandson."^ 

This second explanation may be also true. How- 
ever, the first appears preferable to us, because it is the 
traditional explanation, which the ancients have given; 
it was founded on the Jewish customs, and the Christians 
of pagan origin would have scarcely imagined of them- 
selves a similar solution; also Julius Africanus teaches us 
that they obtained this explanation from the Desposyni 
or parents of the Saviour, which made him say: " It is 
not destitute of proofs and is no fiction." St. Matthew, 
writing for the Jews, has very probably reproduced, as 
Grotius assures us, the legal genealogy of Joseph, legit- 
imate heir to the throne of David. St. Luke, writing 

1 D. Strauss, "Op. cit." 



VERACITY OF THE GOSPELS. 55 1 

for the Gentiles, has inserted in his Gospel the real 
genealogy of the spouse of Mary. One can also admit, 
with a certain number of interpreters, that the Blessed 
Virgin was a cousin of St. Joseph and that, when the 
tables of the Gospel do not give us formally her gene- 
alogy, they give us, however, the same in fact, for she 
was also, Hke her spouse, of the tribe of Juda and of the 
race of David. 



2. THE CENSUS OF QUIRINUS. 

St. Luke relates, at the beginning of his Gospel, that 
Jesus Christ was born at Bethlehem at the same time 
when the census was taken in Judea, under the govern- 
ment of Quirinus, legate of Syria. ^ The enemies of 
revelation pretend that no such census was ever taken, 
and that it is through an anachronism that the Evangel- 
ists say that Quirinus was the legate of Syria at the 
time of the Saviour's birth. 

The most of the Rationalists, and even a great num- 
ber of ancient critics maintain that Quirinus became 
governor of Syria only after the year 5 of our era, that 
is, some years after the birth of Jesus Christ, who was 
born, as St. Matthew states, before the death of Herod, 
which occurred four years before our era. 

However, no contradiction exists, and all that St. 
Luke states is exact and historical. In the first place, 
he teaches us that the Emperor Agustus pubHshed an 
edict ordaining a census of the whole Roman Empire. 
Now, Mr. Reuss maintains that this census took place 
only when Judea was incorporated into the empire, 
ten vears, at least, after the birth of our Lord, and as 



^ Luke ii, 1-2. 



552 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

this census referred particularly to the ancient king- 
dom of Herod, he denies that it had been taken in ac- 
cordance with a general edict. 

Several commentators, struck by the fact that 
Quirinus had proceeded to the enumeration related by 
Josephus,^ in the year 6 of our era, and because 
we do not find in the ancient authors any trace of 
an analogous operation made by this same Quirinus 
under Herod, have believed that St. Luke wished to 
distinguish the census executed under Herod from that 
which had been made about ten years later on under 
Quirinus, and, according to them, it is on account of 
a false version of the text of the Evangelist that one has 
admitted a first census rnade by Quirinus, one must 
translate: ''This census was made before Quirinus be- 
came legate of Syria;" and not: ''The first enrolling 
was made by Quirinus, legate of Syria." The Greek 
word prote has not in this passage of the Gospel, the 
positive meaning, but the comparative sense before. 
This is what we can call the philological interpretation. 
It is rejected in the name of grammar by different com- 
mentators and historians. — Although it may be correct 
rigorously speaking, we have to admit that it does not 
appear plausible; there is no good reason why St. Luke 
should have made allusion in this passage to the census 
of the year 6 of our era, if Quirinus did not play an 
important part in the facts which he relates. Besides, 
this interpretation is useless, for it is historically cer- 
tain, against Mr. Reuss and those whose opinion he has 
reproduced, that Augustus had ordered a census to be 
made of the whole Roman Empire, in the epoch men- 
tioned by St. Luke. This fact is attested by several 

^ Josephus, *'Ant. Jud.," xvii, ii, 4. 



VERACITY OF THE GOSPELS. 553 

ancient authors, the most, it is true, little known, but 
whose testimony is not any the less incontestable. 

The opposition has tried to attenuate the force of 
the arguments which establish that 2\ugustus had or- 
dained this census for the whole empire, in saying, that 
the imperial edict could not apply to Judea, during the 
reign of Herod, before it was incorporated to the 
empire. This objection is unfounded. Augustus, 
undoubtedly, did not wish to subject the Jews, under 
the reign of Herod, to a direct taxation, but he wished 
to prepare the way for the union of Judea, and to know 
exactly what were the resources, in men and money, 
of the kingdoms which were only his allies. Tacitus 
tells us expressly that the Emperor had drawn up a 
" Breviary of the Empire " which enumerated his allies.^ 
He could have obtained this information only by means 
of a census. Hence, the enrolling was made in the 
allied kingdoms and consequently in Palestine. 

It did not take place, at least, under the administra- 
tion of Ouirinus, retort the infidels, for this Roman 
functionary was placed at the head of the province of 
Syria only after the deposition of Archelaus, the suc- 
cessor of Herod. — A great number of orthodox com- 
mentators, even among those who acknowledge that 
a first census had been made in Judea some years before 
our era, have been so struck by the silence of the ancient 
authors, and in particular by that of Josephus, in regard 
to a first legation of Quirinus, that they have believed, 
indeed, that this personage had presided over the census 
only in the quality of extraordinary envoy of Augustus. 
But in future ever3^body has to admit with St. Luke the 
double legation of Quirinus in Syria, for it. is proved by 

^ Tacitus, "Annales," i, II. 



554 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

an epigraphic monument preserved in the Museum of 
the Lateran at Rome. 

3. THE SITE OF EMMAUS. 

'' What Luke states in regard to Emmaus," says 
Renan, " cannot be justified by any typographical 
hypothesis.'' Here our ignorance is brought up as 
a proof of the pretended errors of St. Luke. We have 
no knowledge of the exact location of Emmaus; how, 
therefore, can we prove that St. Luke was in error, since 
we have only his own accounts to determine its site? 
Mr. Renan pretends that '' what concerns Emmaus is 
not justifiable in any topographical hypothesis," and 
he expressly supposes that Kolonia occupies the site of 
the ancient Emmaus. '' Kolonia," he says, '' is about 
three and a half miles from Jerusalem." But, we repeat 
it, the situation from Emmaus is problematic and, it 
is even to-day, the subject of animated controversy. 
Hence, one cannot establish that St. Luke erred in fix- 
ing the distance from Jerusalem to Emmaus. The 
primitive local tradition located the latter place in 
Emmaus-Nicopohs, the actual Amouas, and the first 
Christians of Palestine should certainly have had some 
knowledge as to this point. 

4. " Joanna is a feminine name and difficult to 
admit," continues Renan. How can a professor of 
Hebrew make this assertion? It is well known that 
the feminine proper name, Anna, exists in Hebrew, in 
both the Old and New Testaments, and all the Hebraists 
know that Anna and Joanna are the same name, because 
they dififer only by the abridged element of the name 
of Jehovah, understood in the first case, and expressed 
in the second. Compare Nathan and Jonathan, Saphat 



VERACITY OF THE GOSPELS. 555 

and Josaphat or Sephatya, which are different forms of 
the same name. Hence, here the error is not in St. 
Luke. 

5. " In his accomit, Luke," Renan again pretends, 
" supposes on account of distraction the roof covered 
with tiles, consequently inclined. The flat roofs are 
always terraced." — The author of the '' Evangiles " 
avows himself further on, that St. Luke knew the flat 
form of the roofs of Palestine. Moreover, in the sup- 
posed erroneous passage, the EvangeHst does not state 
at all that the roof he speaks of was inclined. Renan 
makes him say this, in order to accuse him of error. St. 
Luke says that they led the sick down through the tiles,^ 
which does not signify tiles properly speaking, but 
bricks. The locution is employed to designate a roof, 
JDecause they made use of bricks to construct the roofs, 
and it is in this sense that it is employed, for example, 
by Aristophanes;^ but in no m.anner can one conclude 
from this that St. Luke wished to speak about an 
inclined roof, nor of a roof made really of bricks, 
although the bricks could serve to form the terraces. 
To treat a metaphor of this kind as an error is not the 
work of a sincere critic. Besides, the text proves 
clearly that it was not a terrace upon which they ascend- 
ed by an independent stairway. The stairway which 
leads up to the flat roofs of the houses, in the Orient, is 
ordinarily arranged in such a way that one has access to 
it without being obliged to pass throtigh any apart- 
ment. At Jerusalem, where it frequently rains, the 
terraces on the houses are often paved, at least in the 
present day, to facilitate the flowing off of the water. 

1 Luke V, 19. 

2 Aristophanes, " Fragment," 129^. 



556 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Therefore, in olden times, they may have covered them 
with tiles. In order to make certain repairs or improve- 
ments, they uncovered a part of the terraces (Mark ii, 
4), through the opening of which they hoisted different 
objects. Therefore, all the details which the Evangel- 
ist gives in regard to the episode of the paralytic are 
protected against criticism. 

6. CHRIST'S PUBLIC LIFE; THE PORTRAYAL OF JESUS 
GIVEN BY THE SYNOPTICS. 

The principal objection which is brought up against 
the veracity of St. John is based upon the essential 
difiference which the critics pretend to discover between 
the portrayal of Jesus traced by the Synoptics and that 
of St. John. M. Renan, summing up all the rationahstic 
arguments, writes: ^' On the one hand, this Gospel (of 
St. John) presents to us a picture of the hfe of Jesus 
which notably differs from that of the Synoptics. On 
the other hand, John puts into the mouth of Jesus dis- 
courses whose tone, style, behavior and doctrines have 
nothing common with the Logia reported by the 
vSynoptics. Under the second respect, the difference 
is such that one must make his choice in a decided man- 
ner. When Jesus spoke as Matthew claims, he could 
not speak as John pretends. Between the two author- 
ities, no critic has hesitated. . . . This does not 
mean that there are not in the discourses of St. John 
wonderful explanations, traits w^hich are really derived 
from Jesus. But the mystic tone of these discourses 
corresponds in nothing to the character of eloquence 
of Jesus such as we imagine it according to the Synop- 
tics. A new spirit has breathed, the gnosis has already 
commenced; the Galilean era of the kingdom of God is 



VERACITY OF THE GOSPELS. 557 

finished; the hope of the near coming of the Messiah 
is removed ;'One enters the aridities of metaphysics, the- 
darkness of abstract dogma. The spirit of Jesus is 
there no longer, and when the son of Zebedee did really 
trace these pages, we have to suppose that he had for- 
gotten in writing them the lake of Genesareth and the 
charming entertainments which he had heard on its 
shores."^ 

To answer to these objections we have to remark 
in the first place that the differences one pretends to 
discover between the last Gospel and the three Synop- 
tics, would the}^ be as grave as it is pretended, the 
Rationalists would not have on this account the right 
to conclude that St. John is not the author of the fourth 
Gospel, as Mr. Reuss has correctly observed when he 
says: '' Is it necessary, when there is question of differ- 
ent authors, to conclude from the diversity of ideas, 
from the shades of the conception of a theory, to an 
absolute priority of the one? Is it possible that in one 
and the same epoch, and especially in the same sur- 
roundings, different conceptions could produce them- 
selves, the one more advanced, more elevated, and 
newer than the others? Have there never been men 
who were ahead of their contemporaries, and who ad- 
hered to more antiquated theories or popular beliefs? 
Hence, the theology of the fourth Gospel is 
not sufficient in itself to determine the epoch of its com- 
position." 

7. THE BEGINNING OF THE PUBLIC MINISTRY OF JESUS. 

According to Dr. Strauss, one account makes the 
public ministry of Jesus commence after the arrest of 

1 E. Renan, "Vie de Jesus," p. lix-lx. 



558 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

John, the other before this. "John says (iii, 24) that 
when Jesus began his pubHc Hfe, John (the Baptist) was 
not yet cast into prison; now Matthew (iv, 12) depicts 
the return of Jesus into Galilee only after the arrest of 
John the Baptist." — Where is the contradiction ? St. 
Matthew does not state that Jesus commenced to 
preach only after the imprisonment of the precursor. 
Even Paulus, a Rationalist, has remarked that St. 
Matthew relates here the return into Galilee which fol- 
lowed, not the baptism of Jesus by John, but the first 
feast of the Pasch. 

8. PLACE OF RESIDENCE OF THE HOLY FAMILY. 

St. Luke explains to us quite at length why Joseph 
and Mary had gone to Bethlehem. St. Matthew tells 
us, like St. Luke, that Jesus was born at Bethlehem, 
and he teaches us, moreover, that on their return from 
Egypt, the Holy Family went to Nazareth, where St. 
Luke had shown us the same settled at the moment 
when the angel Gabriel came to announce to Mary the 
great mystery of the Incarnation, and no critical his- 
torian of Jesus will behold here any contradiction, but, 
on the contrary, perfect harmony. For further particu- 
lars see objection fourteen. 

9. THE NAME LEVI. 

Dr. Strauss also sees a contradiction in the fact that 
St. Matthew is called Levi by two Evangelists,^ in the 
history of his vocation. — Strauss might as well discover 
a contradiction in the double name of Simon Peter. 



Mat. ix, 9; Mark ii, 14; Luke ¥,27. 



VERACITY OF THE GOSPELS. 559 

lO. THE DEMONIACS OF GADARA. 

" Mark and Luke," says Strauss, " name only one, 
. Matthew names two."^ — This is true, but from 
this it does not follow that St. Matthew is deceived. 
The rule,vv^e have to follow in explaining the divergent 
accounts, is that the most circumstantiated and most 
precise must be accepted Uterally, whilst the other 
accounts ought to be understood in a general manner. 
In the case in question, two demoniacs come forth from 
tombs, which in this country often served as dwelling 
places for entire families; St. Matthew mentions both; 
St. Mark and St. Luke are less precise and speak only 
of the one whose riddance of the affliction was most 
important to mention. 

II. ANOTHER PRETENDED CONTRADICTION. 

" According to one historian/' says Strauss, '' the 
John the Baptist acknowledged Jesus the Messiah 
destined to sufTer; according to the other, he is sur- 
prised at His suffering state." — But we also acknowl- 
edge Jesus as the Messiah, and we are nevertheless sur- 
prised that He wished to suffer as He has suffered. 

12. THE HISTORY OF THE VOCATION OF THE APOSTLES. 

The critical historian of Jesus sees also a contra- 
diction in the history of the vocation of the apostles. 
" According to one account," says he, " it is on the 
shores of the lake of Galilee that Jesus told his first 
disciples to leave their nets and follow Him; according 
to another account, gained them to His doctrine in 
Judea, and when He went into Galilee. — Both are true 



Mat. viii, 28; Mark v, 2; Luke v 



560 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

The Saviour had already called them to Him in Judea, 
and He made them leave later on their nets in Galilee to 
remain with Him, and to follow Him in His apostolic 
travels. 

13. FINALLY. 

Strauss declares as suspicious the si^nilar events 
which took place twice, the discourses which have been 
repeated on different occasions, the facts which are 
omitted by some of the Evangelists, and are men- 
tioned only by one. — There is, however, nothing extra- 
ordinary that the same man should repeat several 
similar actions; for a painter to paint twice the same 
picture, for a professor to repeat the same lesson to 
two classes of different scholars, for a preacher to preach 
the same sermon to two distinct audiences, for a thau- 
maturgus to heal successively persons affficted with the 
same illness: all this is evident. As to the silence, 
Strauss is right in saying that " such an argument is 
of no value " of itself. He adds that '' there is much 
therein when one can prove that the second narrator 
would have spoken of the thing if he had known it, and 
would have known it if it had taken place "; but he does 
not prove that this rule finds its application in t'he 
accounts of the Evangelists. 

14. THE MAGI AND THE FLIGHT INTO EGYPT. 

The Gospel tells us that the Magi did not return 
from Bethlehem to Herod, but went back another way 
into their own country. Then, according to Matthew, 
Joseph, warned by an angel in sleep, took the Child and 
His Mother, and retired into Egypt, and he was there 
until the death of Herod. Against these statements, 



VERACITY OF THE GOSPELS. 561 

a great difficulty is raised from the second chapter of 
St. Luke; for he says that after the days of His purifi- 
cation, according- to the law of Moses, were accom- 
plished (Mary and Joseph) carried Him to Jerusalem, 
to present Him to the Lord. The day appointed for 
the presentation was the fortieth after the birth. And 
then St. Luke continues: "And after they had per- 
formed all things according to the laws of the Lord, 
they returned into Galilee, to their city Nazareth." 
According to the first Gospel, the birth of Jesus, the 
coming of the Magi, their return and the Right of 
Joseph with the Child and His mother, seem to have 
taken place in the immediate succession, before Joseph 
had left Bethlehem; but how could St. Luke say with- 
out coming into contradiction with St. Matthew that 
the Child was presented to the Lord in the Temple on 
the fortieth day after His birth, and that Joseph returned 
after the presentation from Jerusalem to Nazareth? 
To evade this difficulty, some authors assert that the 
coming of the Magi did not take place, as it is 
the common opinion, a few days after the birth of the 
Lord, but much later. Joseph, they say, had returned 
in the meantime to Nazareth, not to stay there perma- 
nently, but with the intention to arrange all his affairs in 
such a manner as to leave Nazareth entirely, and to take 
his future abode in Bethlehem. At the time when the 
Magi came, perhaps a year after the birth of the Child, 
he had already returned to Bethlehem; the ffight to 
Egypt followed then also about a year after the birth of 
Jesus. Yet this conjecture seems to be somewhat 
against the text of St. Matthew who connects the 
coming of the Magi most intimately with the nativity 
of the Lord, saying: " When, therefore, Jesus was born 
D. B.— 36 



562 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

in Bethlehem of Judea, in the days of King Herod, be- 
hold there came Magi from the east to Jerusalem. 
Moreover, it is a very ancient and constant tradition 
that the Magi came thirteen days after the birth of the 
Lord. 

Schegg in his commentary to St. Luke offers, 
therefore, another combination of the stated evangeli- 
cal facts; he supposes that the whole that St. Matthew 
and St. Luke relate, took place in a very short time. 
The Magi came a few days after the birth of the Lord, 
and returned immediately; Herod, seeing himself de- 
ceived, did not delay the execution of his design; hence 
the flight into Egypt succeeded immediately after the 
return of the Magi; but as the death of Herod occurred 
not long after, the Holy Family could have returned to 
Jerusalem, perhaps, two months after the birth of the 
Lord; the Child was then presented to the Lord in 
the Temple of Jerusalem, and from thence brought to 
Nazareth according to the statement of St. Luke. But 
this combination is in direct contradiction with St. 
Matthew (ii, 22), where we read that Joseph, hearing 
that Archelaus reigned in Judea, instead of Herod, his 
father, was afraid to go thither, that is, to Judea. 
Hence, we adopt with Kenrick (on Luke ii, 39), the 
solution of the difficulty offered by St. Augustine; he 
places first the return of the Magi, then the presenta- 
tion in the Temple, after this immediately the appari- 
tion of the angel to Joseph and the flight to Egypt; and 
from thence the return to Nazareth. To the difficulty, 
how it can be accounted for, according to this combi- 
nation, that Herod seeing himself deceived, waited so 
long to take his cruel measures, the same Father 
answers: '' Herod may have believed that the Magi 



VERACITY OF THE GOSPELS. 563 

having been deceived by a delusive appearance of the 
star, and not finding the Child, were ashamed to return 
to him; therefore, he laid aside all fear. But when the 
Child had been carried to the Temple and all that 
occurred at His presentation, according to Luke, had 
reached the ears of Herod, he was roused once more to 
fury; Joseph, perhaps, already on his way to Nazareth, 
was then warned to retire to Egypt, the more so, as 
the Child was neither safe in Nazareth, this place be- 
longing to the territory of which Herod was king. 
Tillmont remarks, no better answer than this can be 
given; and though he feels himself not perfectly satis- 
fied by it, Benedict XIV, in his work '' De Festis 
Domini," considers it more wise to acquiesce in the 
judgment of so great a Doctor of the Church. 

15. CONCLUSION. 

It is a well known fact that we meet with divergen- 
cies, not only in various authors, but we even find that 
the same author relates the same facts. The same may 
be said of repetitions or omission of things which have 
been related by others. Therefore, it is entirely wrong 
to reproach the evangelical authors of having related 
several times one sole fact as distinct events, under 
pretext that this fact should have been brought forward 
but once. For in doing so, the character of the history 
is not changed in Scripture. It is very necessary not 
to form a false idea of the inspiration of the sacred 
writers when one wishes to understand the Gospels. 
The inspiration does not change the nature. God 
moves the inspired authors to write what He intends 
to make known to man, and He prevents the writers 
from falling into error; but He does not dictate to them 



564 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

the words of which they should make use. According 
to the majority of theologians the inspiration is not 
verbal; the inspired writer preserves the use of his facul- 
ties, he writes in his own manner, with more or less 
accuracy and according to his capacity; his style reflects 
his peculiarities and abiUty; he impresses upon his 
writings the mark of his personality in the same manner 
as any other writer. Hence, he makes use of both his 
intelligence and memory when he relates events which 
he has witnessed or which he has learned through 
the medium of others. God does not ordinarily man- 
ifest them to him through a revelation properly speak- 
ing; He limits Himself in preserving the writer from all 
error and mistake in his writings. Hence, the reason 
why there exists in both the Old and New Testaments a 
divine element which is not found in any other book; 
but there is also in it necessarily a human element, be- 
cause Providence, in order to speak to men, makes use 
of human instruments, who enjoy the human faculties 
and speak the human language. Consequently, the 
inspiration leaves to the authors of the Gospels their 
personal seal, their peculiar aptitudes, their distinctive 
faculties, and it is this, when we join with It the particu- 
lar object which each has in mind, the explanation of 
the divergencies which we remark in their works, and 
which we must necessarily find therein. These differ- 
ences are unavoidable, we repeat it, in the writers of 
all countries; they are more apt to occur In the work 
of an Oriental writer who, by temperament, is little 
Inclined to write with order and method, and who cares 
less than a writer of the Occident to acquire, so to say, 
that mathematical exactitude, exacted from the Evan- 
gelists by certain critics of our day. Now, although St. 



VERACITY OF THE GOSPELS. 565 

Matthew, St. Mark, St. Luke and St. John have always 
been veracious in the biography which they have left us 
of the Divine Master, they have nevertheless remained 
Orientals, and they have written conformably to the 
genius of their nation; they relate the facts and repro- 
duce the discourses, without attaching more importance 
than necessary to the form which they give to their 
thought. They have not, as is common with modern 
writers, entered into minute details, but believed them- 
selves sufficiently exact in reporting the main facts, and 
precise enough for all purposes intended. Thus they 
are all exact, as to the substance, in reporting the in- 
scription of the cross, but only one, St. John, has 
reported it word for word: 

This is Jesus, King of the jfetvs, says St. Matthew. 

The King of the Jeivs^ says St. Mark. 

This is the King of the Jeivs, says St. Luke. 

Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jetvs, says St. John.^ 

Therefore, the Evangelists had not the remotest 
idea of writing a history, so to say, according to. the 
modern formula. There is none of the whimsicalities 
of Rationalism which pronounces judgments against 
the Gospels from the standpoint of a history of 
the Saviour such as Rationalists would have written. 
The historians of Jesus Christ, according to these 
irresistible fault-finders, should have conceived their 
subject and formed the structure of their narrative ac- 
cording to the requirements of actual criticism. Since 
they deviate from this, they do not merit any confi- 
dence; they contradict the reality, as they contradict 
themselves. Since they have not fixed chronologically 
the time and the date, as exact historians never fail to 

* Mat. xxvii, 37; Mark xv, 26; Luke xxiii, 38; John xix, 19. 



566 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

do in the present day, and since they contented them- 
selves to indicate in an indefinite manner in what epoch 
the facts they relate took place, it is concluded from this 
that they were not well instructed about the facts 
themselves. Thus, according to the rationalistic 
method, the history of the foundation of the monastery 
of Carmel, written by the foundress herself, St. Theresa, 
is unworthy of credit, because she does not give the 
year of foundation. 

This manner of judging our Sacred Books, becomes 
so much the more unjust, as it becomes more certain 
that the Evangelists had less the desire to write a his- 
tory of our Lord than to make known His doctrine. 
His teaching is much more important in their eyes 
than all the rest. The facts are only there to serve as 
a frame for the lessons, and to show that He is the 
Messiah, the Son of God. We must never forget these 
things when we attempt to criticise the Gospels. 

Neither must we forget that when the Evangelists 
had a common end in view, that to preserve the teach- 
ing of their Master, they had also each one a particular 
end. St. Matthew has written for the Jews, and he 
desired to show them in Jesus the Messiah announced 
by the prophets; St. Mark and St. Luke have written 
for the Gentiles and had not, consequently, to attach 
the same importance to the predictions of the prophets. 
St. John's purpose was to complete the work of his pred- 
ecessors, and he has related certain facts by them 
omitted, or not given in sufficient fulness, and he has 
called attention to certain teachings which had an im- 
portant bearing on the rising heresies in the earlv 
Church. This diversity in the objects intended resulted 
in a different exposition of the facts, because none could 



\"ERACITY OF THE GOSPELS. 567 

teil everything, and because, in the selection one is 
obliged to make, in the midst of the circumstances and 
the details of the events, they had to prefer those that 
were proper to the end they wished to attain. Hence, 
this became another abundant soiu'ce of divergencies. 

Finally, the end in view of the Evangelists would it 
have been identical, the divergencies in their accounts 
would have been, nevertheless, unavoidable, because 
four men. considering the same object or the same fact, 
see and expose it in a different manner, according to 
their faculties and impressions that are made upon 
them. The same personage painted by several painters 
of ability is dift'erently depicted in many particulars by 
each. In history the same phenomenon produces 
itself: the eye witnesses of an event report it always with 
divergencies: there is never an absolute accord among 
the historians who relate the history of a man or of an 
epoch. 

One does not conclude from this that these histo- 
rians are imworthy of belief. One does not deny that a 
battle has been deliA'ered. a citv taken, because Titus- 
Livius. Polybius and Tacitus relate the battle or siege 
with different details. AVhv then have two weights 
and two measures? One has not the right, because he 
claims to be a Rationalist, to demand more from the 
sacred writers than from the profane writers. 

The divergencies between the accounts of the 
Evangelists were, therefore, unavoidable: they should 
not surprise us: even if there were real contradictions 
between the four Gospels, the infidels could not legiti- 
n.iatelv denv their authoritv: thev mio-ht onlv pretend 
that the historians of the Saviour were deceived in some 
points of detail. 



CHAPTER LVIII. 



DEMONIACS AND DEMONIACAL POSSESSION. 
I. THE WORD DEMON. 

DEMONIACAL possession is often disputed. St. 
Matthew, St. Mark and St. Luke, in the three 
first Gospels relate that the Saviour cured a great num- 
ber of these unfortunates. To-day, the reality and even 
the possibiUty of the demoniacal possessions are denied 
in principle by the Rationalists, and according to certain 
infidel physicians, the sick, which the Scriptures call 
demoniacs and possessed, were only nevropaths. The 
descriptions in the New Testament of demoniacs are 
sufUcient, it is claimed, to establish that these imagined 
possessions were simply insane or paralytic demonstra- 
tions. Now, those afflicted in this manner can be cured 
through exaltation of the imagination, for it is estab- 
lished by numerous authenticated experiments that the 
imagination sometimes cures the nevropaths where 
they excite themselves in a manner that give to their 
nerves a lively and sudden shock. 

Let us see first, in answer to these critics, what 
Scripture teaches about the demons and the possessed; 
then we shall compare the possessed of the Gospel with 
the sick of our infidel physicians. 

Both the Old and the New Testaments teach us that 
evil spirits exist, hardened in evil, wishing evil to man, 
and ever tempting him to evil. These evil spirits 
(S68) 



DEMONIACS AND DEMONIACAL POSSESSION. 569 

receive two different names, demons and devils ; the 
latter name, in Scripture, is given only to the chief of 
the fallen angels. 

The word '' demon " appears to signify '' knowing " 
or " dividing." The sacred writers have borrowed it 
from the profane writers, but attach to it a more precise 
and determined sense. In Homer, demon is about 
synonymous with deity: the old poet employs both 
words to express the same meaning (Ihad, xix, 188; 
xvii, 98; iii, 420, etc.). It is not thus in Hesiod: the 
chanter of the Days distinguishes the deities from the 
demons ; the latter are the souls of men who lived 
during the Golden Age. They are the good genii 
('•' Opera et dies," 121-122, edit. Didot, p. 33). How- 
ever, as can 1)e seen that neither in the one nor in the 
other, has the name of demon an evil definition. The 
Jew Philo employs it to designate the angels, both good 
and bad. Josephus, on the contrary, speaks of demons 
in the same sense as the Gospels (Antiq. viii, 2, 5; 
War. vii, 41, 3). This change in the meaning from a 
good to the evil genius was effected in great part among 
the pagans themselves. The daimon of the Greek 
tragedians is often an evil genius, the bad genius of a 
family, for instance, like that of the family of Agamem- 
non. Man, dominated by a furious passion, which pre- 
cipitates him into crime and misfortune, is represented 
as tmder the power of a daimon. 

From the ancient word daimon, the Hellenists, in a 
more recent epoch, formed the neutral adjective dai- 
monion, employed substantially to signify something- 
more vague than daiinon. Plato makes of the term, 
in his " Banquet," to designate interm.ediary beings 
between God and men, " messenofers " from the one to 



570 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

the Other. The daimon of Socrates is famiUar. Au- 
thorities differ as to the nature of this daimonion. Did 
the philosopher consider thus an advising spirit or a 
sort of inner oracle whose orders he obeyed? We 
venture no opinion. What is certain is, that the illus- 
trious Athenian was accused of introducing the worship 
of a new daimonion, not acknowledged by the Republic. 
It is equally certain that the demon of Socrates was a 
good genius. 

Such were the diverse significations attached to the 
word demon, when the Septuagint undertook the 
Greek translation of the Old Testament. They never 
applied the name to the true God, but they made use of 
it three times to name or qualify the false gods or idols, 
once in Deuteronomy (xxxii, 17) and twice in the 
Psalms (ex, 37; xcv, 5). In Deuteronomy and in Psalm 
cv, the corresponding Hebrew word is sedim, primitive 
meaning of which appears to be that of '' masters " and 
by which the Rabbis understand the demons in the 
modern sense. In Psalm xcv, the word of the Hebrew 
original is 'elilim, " the haughty," that is, the idols. 
The Septuagint have also translated by '' demon " in 
the prophet Isaias the name of gad, the deified '' for- 
tune " (Is. Ixv, 11) and the name of 'se irim, by the 
''hairy" the roebucks (Is. xiii, 21). Finally, in Psalm 
xc, 6: Qui habitat in adjurtorio Altissimi, the Greek 
translators have transformed the verb " to devastate " 
into a name of agent " to exercise power " and they 
have rendered it " noonday devil." In all these pas- 
sages the Jewish interpreters have designated demons 
what they considered as Idols or false gods. 

The study of the Greek of the Septuagint has a very 
great bearing on the correct Intelligence of the original 



DEMONIACS AND DEMONIACAL POSSESSION. 5/1 

text of the New Testament, because their language is 
that of the Hellenist Tews, and, consequently, that of 
the deuterocanonical books of the Old Testament as well 
as that of the apostles in the New Testament. The 
translators of the protocanonicals had called the false 
gods demons ; the translators or authors of the deutero- 
canonical books received from them this appellation and 
gave it an evil meaning, in applying it not only to the 
false gods, but in general to the fallen angels. It is 
with the same signification we give it to-day that the 
term demon is employed in Tobias (vi, 7) and in 
Baruch (iv, 35); however, the Book of Tobias deter- 
mines its nature in several passages by adding the 
epithet of '' evil " (iii, 8, 17; vi, 7). For the writers of 
the New^ Testament, demon simply means an evil spirit 
(Mat. xi, 12, 43, etc.). He is represented as a pure 
spirit, originally, of the same nature as the good angels, 
but revolted against God, under the leadership of a 
chief, whom the people called Beelzebub, like the 
ancient deity of Accaron, and who is none other than 
Satan(Mat. xii, 24-27; Luke x, 17-18). He is forever 
plunged in evil; the enemy of God and man, and seeks 
only to injure man, by tempting him to sin (I Tim. iv, 
i), and even by inflicting the body with physical ills. 

It is this evil tendency of the demon which gained 
for him the other name by which he is known among the 
Christians, that of devil diabolos. This term, which 
signifies calumniator, detractor and accuser, and which 
is always employed as common substantive in the classic 
writings of Greece, has become in the New Testament 
a sort of proper name of the evil spirit. The apostles 
borrowed it from the Septuagint. In their version, 
the word diabolos is the translation of ''Satan," of which 



5/2 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

we read in the Hebrew text of the Book of Job (i, ii), 
of the Paralipomenons (xxi, i), and of Zacharias (iii, 
1-2), to designate the chief of the demons, the author of 
evil, who persecutes man and seeks to injure God. 
Hence it comes that this name, in the Gospels and in 
the Epistles, does not apply to the evil spirits in general, 
but only to their chief, called also in many passages by 
his Hebrew name Satan or "enemy" (Mat. iv, 10; 
Mark iii, 26; Luke x, 18, etc.). 

The prince of the demon or the demons themselves 
being evil spirits, and inclined towards evil, have sought 
since the beginning of the world to injure men, like 
roaring lions in pursuit of prey (Gen. iii; Job i-ii; Wisd. 
ii, 24; I Pet. V, 8). They are the enemies of God, but 
as they cannot harm Him, they attack Him indirectly 
through his creation, man. To rob the soul, the most 
precious part of our being, from its maker is their 
special object, but sometimes they also torment the 
body as was quite frequently the case in the time of our 
Saviour. 

2. DEMONIACAL POSSESSIONS. 

The victims of the furies of the demon are known 
under the name of demoniacs, or possessed of a demon. 
The Gospels describe what these unfortunates had to 
sufifer. Even the word possessed indicates that they were 
no longer their own masters, but that they had fallen 
under the power of evil spirits, to Avhom they served 
as instruments and organs. Besides, the NewTestament 
does not employ the word possessed ; the term by which 
it designates those whom the demon had taken hold 
of, has the same meaning, but expresses more strongly 
their subjection to the spirit of evil, in whom they seem 
to be transformed, hence thev were called endernonized. 



DEMONIACS AND DEMONIACAL POSSESSION. 573 

Later, the ecclesiastical language of the Greeks, termed 
the demoniacs '' energumens." However, the words 
'' possessed by the demon " or, by ellipsis, possessed 
and possession, became the ordinary terminology of the 
Christians. The Arabic language also designates the 
demoniac possessed, masMm, inalbus, m amUr, thing un- 
derstood, //-/-^V;?;/, possessed by a djinn (genius) or a de- 
mon. We must remember that the Talmud has no term 
to signify, either the possessed or the possession : It 
speaks of the evil spirit persecuting man, but it never 
says that he enters into him, and that he takes posses- 
sion of him. The New Testament, on the contrary, re- 
veals the demon as the master of the one of whom he 
took possession, and in whom he dwells. The words 
which proceed from the mouths of the possessed are 
accordingly not their own, but those of the evil spirits ; 
their strength is often on this account extraordinary 
and superhuman. 

However, the possession, or the effects of pos- 
session, such as the Gospels speak of were not continu- 
ous ; the unfortunate demoniac became master of him- 
self at intervals; the spirit which tormented him left 
him some moments of rest; but soon he felt anew the 
whole weight of the burden, his intelligence and will 
vanished, and, powerless to control his faculties, physi- 
cal evils of all kinds augmented his torments; almost 
always the possession is accompanied with infirmities, 
such as blindness (Mat. xii, 22), dumbness (Mat. ix, 
32), or bodily disorders, principahy nervous troubles, 
insanity (Mark i, 5) epilepsy (Mark x, 16-26). 

It is the concomitant of illness to this extraordinary 
state which has furnished pretext to the modern infidels 
to deny the truth of possession: they only see in those 



574 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

whom the Gospels call demoniacs victims of diseases — 
insanity, epilepsy, dumbness, etc. In the language of 
the New Testament, " to have a demon," according to 
infidel reasoning, simply means to be demented (John 
vii, 20; viii, 48; x, 20); there exists, in the descriptions of 
the cases of possession, no feature, no detail which char- 
acterizes a specific and particular state; on the contrary, 
modern medicine discovers in the possessed all the 
peculiar symptoms in the natural diseases which it 
studies, and which it tries to cure: nevroses, halluci- 
nations, hysterics, epilepsy. Who does not recognize, for 
instance, a case of ordinary epilepsy in the pretended 
possessed whom St. Matthew and St. Mark represent to 
us falling now in the w^ater and then in the fire, gnash- 
ing with his teeth and throwing scum from his mouth? 
(Mat. xvii, 14; Mark ix, 17, 19, 21). How can one help 
recognizing a furious madman in the so-called demo- 
niac of Gadara, who lives in tombs, gives vent to 
frightful shrieks, disfigures himself with stones, breaks 
the cords by which they wish to fetter him, and becomes 
the terror of the countr}^? (Mark v, 3-5). It is the 
same with all the other cases of possession say the 
RationaHsts. 

One cannot doubt that the possessed of the Gospels 
had diseases, the symptoms of which agree in general 
with known natural diseases, according to the descrip- 
tions given by the three Synoptics. Also, a certain 
number of Protestant critics, even among those who 
admit the supernatural, believe in our days that they 
can deny the reality of the possessions. According to 
them the credibility of the evangelical account has 
nothing to sufifer from their opinion, they assure us. 
Our Lord and the apostles in speaking of the demo- 



DEMONIACS AND DEMONIACAL POSSESSION. 575 

niacs, adopted the language of that time but did not 
accept its superstitions and errors. When Jesus Christ 
speaks of possession by the demon, in order to be 
understood by those whom he addresses, he borrows 
the terminology of which they made use to designate 
certain extraordinary illnesses, such as insanity and 
epilepsy, which, by their singular character and phe- 
nomenal nature, have always appealed to the superstition 
of the masses. Even to this day, in the Orient, an insane 
person is looked upon as afHicted by an evil spirit. In 
lieaHng the sick, it w^as not necessary for the Saviour to 
discuss the false or varied notions of the multitude, he 
conformed his speech to the understanding of the people. 

Such is the argument of the Rationalists. It is 
untenable. Undoubtedly, we admit that Scripture very 
often makes use of popular locutions, although taken 
literally, they may be fallacious, the usage had familiar- 
ized a certain terminology among the people and its 
employ was suf^ciently justified. We meet examples 
in the Sacred Books where the text seemingly contra- 
dicts scientific truths or things indifferent in reHgious 
matters, for instance, in the familiar miracle of Josue, 
when the successor of Moses commanded the sun to 
stop. But a like interpretation cannot be made where 
the Saviour and the apostles speak of the possessions. 
That the people, always inclined to exaggerate, some- 
times imagined possessions where only ordinary diseases 
existed, certainly is possible ; but that certain persons 
from whom the Saviour expelled the demons were not 
really possessed, is irreconcilable with the language of 
the Gospels. 

Our Lord did not speak of the possessed only before 
the masses, but also to his disciples in the instructions 



5/6 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

which He gave them, and His language is always such 
that leaves no doubt of the reality of demoniacal posses- 
sions (Mat. xvii, 17-20; Luke x, 17-20). One of His 
discourses has entirely for subject the contradiction 
which would exist between Satan and the demons, his 
minions, if He, Jesus, expelled the demons from the 
bodies of the possessed by the power of the prince of 
the demofts (Mat. xii, 25-29; Luke xi, 15-26). How 
could lie have thus reasoned if He did not really expel 
the demons ? Therefore, He did not speak according 
to popular belief, but according to truth. 

Note also, on the authority of Josephus, that there 
existed in regard to this subject a popular idea which 
was erroneous, and of v^^hich no trace in the New Testa- 
ment can be discovered. The current beUef insisted on, 
was that the souls of the wicked entered into the pos- 
sessed; the wicked, after their death, came also to tor- 
ment the living (Antq. vi, 11, 2; vi, 7, 2; viii, 5; War. 
vii, 6, 3). We read nothing of this in the Gospels. 

We must, therefore, admit that the possessed were 
really under the power of the demons. Their victims, 
it is true, were often attacked with nervous or other 
diseases, the symptoms of which were ordinary symp- 
toms of natural disorders, but even in such complicated 
cases it is not difficult to designate some specific char- 
acteristics of the possession. The sacred writers do 
not confound the demoniacs with merely ill persons or 
infirm (Mat. iv, 24; Mark i, 32, 34; Luke v, 17-18). 
For them, every mute was not possessed (Cf. Mat. ix, 
32 and Mark vii, 32). St. Matthew expressly distin- 
guishes the demoniacs from the lunatics, the insane 
and the paralytics (Mat. iv, 24). That which, in their 
accounts, is the most important or distinguishing 



DEMONIACS AND DEMONIACAL POSSESSION. 577 

feature of possession, is that the demon speaks through 
the mouth of the possessed, who manifests a super- 
natural knowledge, by proclaiming that Jesus is not 
only the Son of David, as the Jews called Him, but the 
Son of God and the Messiah (Mat. viii, 29; Mark i, 24, 
34; V, 7; Luke iv, 41 ; Cf. Acts xix, 15). The possessed 
are cured, when the demons leave their bodies. To 
demonstrate to us the reality of the possession, Jesus 
Christ permits the demons who leave the bodies of the 
possessed of Gadara to enter into swines who throw 
themselves into Lake Tiberiades (I Mat. viii, 30-32; 
Mark v, 9-13). 

The proper and distinctive character of the posses- 
sion is, therefore, the total or partial loss of reason and 
will, produced through the habitation of the demon in 
the body of the possessed. The actions of the unfortu- 
nate, his words and, to a certain point, his thoughts, are 
those of the evil spirit and not his own; he has in some 
manner lost his personality, or at least he has in him a 
real duality; he is under the power, under the tyranny of 
the demon ; he may struggle against this odious burden 
and temporarily succeed in ridding himself of it, but 
soon he falls again under the dreadful influence in spite 
of all his efforts to reconquer his independence from the 
control of his oppressor; it is the wicked spirit that 
speaks through his mouth, he is the instrument and 
organ; this lamentable state ceases only when the 
Saviour has miraculously expelled the demon (Mat. 
viii, 29-31; Mark i, 24; v, 7, 9, 12; Luke iv, 41; viii, 27- 
39; Acts X, 38). 

Objection is urged against the reality of demoniacal 
possession, because we find no mention of them in the 
Old Testament; St. John does not speak of them in his 

B. D.-37 



578 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Gospel, and finally, because they are unknown in our 
days, or rather are known to be only simple and natural 
pathological states. 

The illnesses which the contemporary physicians 
identify with the ancient possessions are different from 
them, as one can determine by the characters we have 
indicated. Exaltation of the imagination could not 
have effected a cure of the disorders attested to by the 
Gospels in the cases of some of those possessed: thus, 
the demoniacs of Gadara, who. were neither epileptics 
nor hysterics, but furiously insane persons (Mark v, 
2-5). Imagination could never have cured these furious 
hallucinations. All the miraculous cures of the New 
Testament, and in particular those of the possessed, are 
entirely different from subjects remedied by hypnotism 
— another explanation of the driving out of the de- 
mons. That to this day there are people possessed of 
demons is attested on the authority of missionaries in 
pagan countries who not infrequently meet with them. 
And who can afifirm that there are none such among us? 

But, how^ever this may be, the actual ceasing of the 
possessions would not prove that they did not exist in 
the time of our Lord, nor the non-existence before 
Christ. God could have given this power to the demon 
during the stay of Christ on earth, and neither before 
nor afterwards, just as He has permitted the frequency 
of certain miracles in the early days of the Church, 
which ceased to occur afterwards. Moreover, the pos- 
sessions could have existed without history mention- 
ing them. But the records of the Church testify that 
they have been frequently noted after Christ, although 
they were more common during the Apostolic Age 
because God wished to attest in this way how great in 



THE SO-CALLED BRETHREN OF OUR LORD. 5/9 

that time was the sway of Satan, and the magnitudin- 
otis power of the Son of God over the prince of demons. 
The curing of the possessed commanded the attention 
of the pagans, and the authors of the Apologies in favor 
of the Christian rehgion, did not hesitate to draw atten- 
tion to the power of the Exorcist over these victims of 
the evil spirit (Cf. St. Justin, Apol. i, 6 vol. vi, col. 453- 
456). As to St. John, the Evangelist, when he has not 
related expressly curings of demoniacs, it is because one 
of the objects of the Gospel was to complete the account 
of the three Synoptics, and hence it was not necessary 
for him to report their testimony in this particular. 
However, he did speak of demoniacs (John x, 21.) 

The possessions, therefore, are well evidenced facts, 
however extraordinary they may appear and, indeed, 
science in our days does not explain them at all; their 
curing remains a miracle, which a divine power alone is 
capable of producing. 



CHAPTER LIX. 



THE SO-CALLED BRETHREN OF OUR LORD. 

ABOUT the end of the fourth century, a certain 
Helvidius, obscure man, who is known to us only 
by the refutation which St. Jerome has left us of his 
errors, dared to maintain that the Blessed Virgin Mary, 
after the birth of her divine Son, had from her marriage 
with St. Joseph other children, called in the Gospel 
brothers and sisters of Jesus. This monstrous doctrine 



58o DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

which overthrew the dogma of perpetual virgmity of the 
Mother of God, excited all over a great horror and in- 
dignation. vSt. Jerome wrote against it his '' Libellus 
adversus Helvidium." 

Helvidius pretended to support his opinion on 
numerous testimonies of the Holy Scripture. First, he 
quoted in his favor the text of St. Matthew (i, i8): 
'' Before they came together she was found with child, 
of the Holy Ghost." Therefore, he said, they came 
together later on; why, besides, the marriage of St. 
Joseph and Mary, if they had not the intention to con- 
summate their union? St. Jerome opposes to the 
alleged text several places of Scripture, where a prius- 
qiiam does not suppose the ulterior realization of the 
thing which one says to have not yet arrived. He adds 
the argument ad hominem: " If I would say: Helvidius 
was surprised by death before having done penance, 
would it follow from this that he did penance after the 
decease ? " — Besides the honor of Jesus and his 
mother required that the latter was acknowledged as 
the legitimate spouse of Joseph. 

Another not less futile argument of the innovator 
was drawn because in St. Luke Jesus is called the 
'' firstborn '' of Mary (Luke ii, 7). Therefore, said 
Helvidius, Mary had several children; If not, why to 
speak of her firstborn? One should have said only son. 
This sophism rests upon a confusion of ideas. Every 
only child is a firstborn; every firstborn is not an only 
child, but may be this. Do we not say every day that 
a mother died in bringing forth her first child? Also, 
the law of Moses (Exod. xxxiv, 19-20), ordaining to 
ofifer to the Lord every firstborn of the male sex, found 
its application when the mother had given birth to a 



THE SO-CALLED BRETHREN OF OUR LORD. 58 1 

son; one did not need to wait for the birth of the second 
child. 

The third argument is still less soUd. St. Matthew 
says of St. Joseph (i, 25): ''He knew her not (matri- 
monially) till she brought forth her firstborn." There- 
fore, he says, Joseph knew his spouse after this event. 
The falsity of a similar conclusion is set ofif right 
away when we compare these words with a parallel 
text (Deut. xxxiv, 6): ''And no man hath known of 
his sepulchre until this present day." Now, it is well 
known that the tomb of Moses was never discovered. 

The last argument upon which this insultor of the 
Mother of God insists the most is the frequent mention 
in the New Testament of brothers and sisters of Jesus. 
To show that this term must be taken in its strictest 
sense, and to designate maternal brethren of the Saviour, 
Helvidius alleges the testimony of St. Matthew and of 
St. Mark, who make assist at the agony of Jesus upon 
the cross, Mary, mother of James and of Joseph, and 
Salome, the mother of the two sons of Zebedee. He 
pretends that the Mary, mother of James and Joseph, 
is the Mother of Jesus and that, consequently, James 
the Minor and Joseph are the children of the Mother 
of Jesus, and the maternal brethren of the latter. He 
pretends to prove his assertion as follows: "We know 
through St. John that Mary, Mother of Jesus, was 
standing near the cross. Matthew^ and Mark could not 
omit this. Hence, the woman whom they call Mary, 
mother of James and of Joseph, is none other than the 
Mother of Jesus." 

But, we ask in our turn, when these two narrators 
wished to tell us that the Mother of Jesus was there, 
how could it enter their mind to designate her by the 



582 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

name of mother of James and of Joseph? Why did 
they not call her simply: the Mother of Jesus? When 
the silence which they keep about this has something 
surprising, the supposition of the adversary is quite 
simply absurd. One might, in this regard, also ask him 
how St. John in the enumeration which he makes of 
the holy women standing near the cross, could omit 
his own mother Salome? All can be explained without 
great difficulty, when one admits that all the women 
named by the different Evangelists, did not remain 
constantly upon Calvary, gathered in the same group 
during the whole time when Jesus remained on the 
cross, but that they exchanged places. Were they all 
there already at the moment when Jesus spoke to His 
mother and John? Were there not some that came 
only after the death of Christ? The Synoptics speak 
only about them after having related the death of 
Jesus. As to the Mary, mother of James and of Joseph, 
she is designated by St. John under the name of Mary 
of Cleophas. In fact, we shall prove further on that 
Cleophas was the father of James the Minor. 

The Evangelists designate nominally as brothers 
of Jesus four personages: James, Joseph or Joses, 
Simon and Jude (Mat. xiii, 55; Mark vi, 3). Mary, 
mother of James and of Joses (Vulgate Joseph) which, 
according to St. Matthew, kept herself near the cross 
upon Calvary, is called by St. Mark (xv, 40), Mary, 
mother of James the Minor. This James the Minor, 
called thus to distinguish him from another more aged 
namesake, James the Major, son of Zebedee, can be 
only James, son of Alpheus, also a disciple of Jesus, and 
one of the twelve apostles. This conclusion could 
be shaken only if among the disciples of the Saviour 



THE SO-CALLED BRETHREN OF OUR LORD. 583 

there had been a third James, as some really pretend, 
but without any solid foundation. Be this as it may, 
to estabHsh accord between St. John and the first 
two EvangeUsts in the description of the scenes upon 
Calvary, nothing is more natural to identify Mary, 
mother of James the Minor with Mary of Cleophas, 
sister of the Mother of Jesus. When this genitive re- 
lates the relation of wife to husband, Clepohas would 
be the husband of the sister of the Blessed Virgin. 
Therefore, he would be the father of James the Minor, 
and the latter would be the nephew of the Blessed 
Virgin, or at least a near relative of hers. James the 
Minor and James, son of Alpheus, would be one and 
the same personage, if Alpheus and Cleophas are them- 
selves one and the same individual. Now this appears 
out of doubt. For Alpheus is the Aramaic name for 
Cholphaiy whence by a metathesis Klopai or Klopa, 
which is the Greek name of Cleophas. 

Now, uniting the accounts of Hegesippus with those 
of the Evangelists, we arrive at the following conclu- 
sions: When the term soror matris ejus must be taken 
in the strict sense, Joseph and his brother Cleophas or 
Alpheus would have married two sisters called Mary; 
and James the Minor would be the first cousin of Jesus 
under a double title, as son of the sister of the Blessed 
Virgin, and as son of the brother of St. Joseph, foster- 
father of Jesus and real husband of His mother. The 
relationship would be less intimate from the side of the 
Blessed Virgin, if the latter were not the proper sister 
of the wife of Cleophas. This latter point remains 
doubtful, especially because one hardly admits that in 
one and the same family two sisters did carry the same 
name Mary. 



584 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Having thus established the relationship of James 
the Minor in regard to Jesus, one will admit, conse- 
quently, that Joses, also the son of Mary of Cleophas, is 
like James, his brother and first cousin of the Lord. 
It will be the same with Jude, called by St. Luke Judas 
Jacobi (Luke vi, 14-16; Acts i, 13), that is, Jude, 
brother of James; for St. Jude, in the inscription of 
his Catholic Epistle, calls himself brother of James. 
Finally, the fourth first cousin of Jesus will be the Simon 
named in the Gospels, that is, Simeon, son of Cleophas, 
who succeeded St. James on the see of Jerusalem and 
suffered martyrdom in this city. 

All the' above leads us to count at least two of these 
brothers of the Lord among the twelve apostles, namely 
James and Jude. One may even ask whether the apos- 
tle Simon must not be identified with St. Simeon, the 
second bishop of Jerusalem. Antiquity tells us nothing 
about this identity, which the Biblical accounts render, 
however, very probable. The fourth, Joses, never 
belonged to the apostolic college. Had Jesus still other 
near relations, whose names are unknown to us, and to 
whom the Scriptures make allusion? This is quite 
probable. For in the Acts, St. Luke, enumerating the 
persons who withdrew into the Cenacle after the 
ascension of the Lord, names first all the apostles, then 
he adds: with the women and Mary the Mother of Jesus 
and His brethren. Jesus counted, therefore, several 
relatives outside the college of the apostles. Among 
these one will easily find those brethren of the Lord 
who, according to St. John, did not yet believe in 
Jesus, whilst the college of the Twelve was already con- 
stituted and had openly professed Its faith In the divine 
mission of the Master (John vii, 3; Cf. John vi, 68-71). 



THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES. 585 

It does not enter our plan to inquire whether 
there were really any of these cousins of our Lord 
among the apostles: this question is of little impor- 
tance from the apologetical point of view. 



CHAPTER LX. 



THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES. 

THE Book of the x\cts of the Apostles by its common 
allusions to the facts of the life of the Saviour, is 
a striking confirmation of the Evangelical accounts. 
It contains in itself an explanation of the events man- 
ifestly miraculous and of public notoriety; it touches 
with the finger, as it were, the supernatural intervention 
of heaven in the organization and propagation of the 
Church of Jesus Christ. Under these diverse titles this 
book becomes, no less than the Gospels, a shining 
mark for rationalistic attack. The veracity of the 
writing no fair mxinded person is willing to question, 
and no unbiased Biblical scholar will deny it as the Book 
of St. Luke. Unfortunately, however, men have been 
found in every age sceptical of established truths, and 
in the face of incontrovertible testimony. There are 
some who allege that the Acts of the Apostles is not 
the work of St. Luke, nor of his time, and base their 
doubt on the following reasons: 

According to the Tubingen school, this book was 
the principal instrument designed to unify the two 



586 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

parties which had divided the Church of Christ. In- 
deed, nothing is more efficacious, in order to reconcile 
the Petrinians and PauHnians than to put into scene 
the two apostles, Peter and Paul, laboring in harmony 
at the organization of the work of Jesus. Peter receiv- 
ing into the Church the first-fruits of the Gentiles, Paul 
practicing the Mosaic observances and collecting alms 
for the converted Jews, etc. 

This is both a flimsy and false statement of facts, 
unsupported by any evidence or allusion in the Acts 
themselves, or by any unquestionable authority. How- 
ever, it is our duty to prove the authenticity, integrity 
and veracity of this history of the primitive Church, 
and from sources too that will hardly be questioned by 
the adherents of the Tubingen school. 

I. THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES — THEIR AUTHEN- 
TICITY. 

The Book of the Acts of the Apostles bears the 
imprint of authenticity. '' The efforts they have made 
to prove that the third Gospel and the Acts are not 
from the same author, have remained quite fruitless," 
says Renan ('' Les Evangeles," p. 436). The Acts are 
expressly quoted for the first time in the letter of the 
Churches of Lyons and Vienne to the Churches of Asia 
and Phrygia, in A. D. 177. We find them afterwards 
mentioned by most of the Fathers and Doctors: St. 
Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, Origen. 
In the famous passage where he enumerates the writ- 
ings of the New Testament Eusebius in his ** Church 
History " (iii, 25, vol. xx, 269), ranks the Acts of the 
Apostles amongst those which are admitted authentic 
by the whole Christian world. 



THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES. 587 

Evidently, the Book of the Acts carries the mark of 
the epoch in which it was composed. " The gaiety, 
the youthfulness of heart which these Odyssies breathe," 
says Renan " was something new, original and charm- 
ing. The iVcts of the Apostles, expression of the 
first movement of the Christian conscience, is a 
book of joy, of serene order. Since the Homeric 
poems they had not seen a work so full of fresh 
sensations. An early breeze, a sea of odor, if I may 
express myself thus, inspiring of something cheerful 
and strong, penetrates the whole book and makes an 
excellent travelling companion; the exquisite breviary 
of the one who pursues antique traces about the south- 
ern seas. It was the second poetry of Christianism. 
Lake Tiberias and its fishing barges had furnished the 
first. The prefaces which are at the head of both writ- 
ings (the third Gospel and the Acts), the dedication of 
the two to Theophilus, the perfect resemblance of style 
and ideas furnish, . . . abundant proofs " (Renan 
" Les Apotres," p. lo), that St. Luke did compile the 
history of the foundation of the Church, like he did 
the history of its founder, and it is too apparent to 
need further proof. 

2. ACTS OF THE APOSTLES — THEIR INTEGRITY. 

Regarding the integrity of the Acts, they have 
alleged that the change one remarks in the second part 
of the book, where the author speaks in the first person, 
" that the passages where the pronoun us is found, have 
been copied by the last writer of the Acts in an an- 
terior writing; in the original memoirs of the writings 
of St. Paul, of Timothy for instance, and that the 



588 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

writer, by an oversight, would have forgotten to sub- 
stitute to us, the name of the narrator." 

'' This explanation," says Renan, '' is hardly admis- 
sible. Such a negHgence one would understand for the 
most in a rough compilation. But the third Gospel 
and the Acts forms a work very well drawn up, composed 
with reflection, and even with art, written by the same 
hand, and after a followed plan. The two books form 
an absolute whole of the same style, presenting the 
same favorite locations and the same manner to quote 
the Scripture. Such a shocking fault as that in ques- 
tion would be inexplicable. Hence, we are invincibly 
moved to conclude that the one who wrote the end 
of the work wrote also its beginning, and that the nar- 
rator of the whole is the one in the above quoted pas- 
sage.'* (Renan, " Les Apotres," p. 11-12). Hence, we 
have every assurance, even from the infidel Renan, that 
the integrity of the Acts is as firmly established as is 
their authenticity. 

3. ACTS OF THE APOSTLES — THEIR VERACITY. 

A notable point in the author of the Acts is his 
familiarity of the subjects which he relates. Of all the 
Books of Holy Writ, none covers such a vast field, or 
is more familiar to the Jews. St. Luke leads us into 
Syria, Cyprus, Asia Minor, Greece and Italy. His ac- 
counts are full of allusions to the history, morals, cus- 
toms and religions of the peoples who inhabit these 
countries, even the customs of navigation of his time, 
subjects so varied, and in the midst of the mass of 
details he moves with the greatest ease, and expresses 
himself with absolute confidence about persons, places 
and things; also with an exactitude which only a wit- 



THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES. 589 

ness — an ocular, intelligent, attentive and conscien- 
tious one could possess. However, when it is possible 
to control his narrative by profane sources, and this is 
quite often the case, the trial is much in his favor. The 
most persistent and exacting Rationalist has only 
found three points of small consequence to question in 
the Acts, and by a curious singularity, they have refer- 
ence to Jewish, and not to foreign history. 

Outside these episodes. Rationalism can discover 
nothing in a book so full of facts, to contest its histori- 
cal value. It is reduced to the sheer necessity of main- 
taining that the author did knowingly alter the events 
he reports for the purpose of giving them a meaning 
which they have not in reality. We propose to discuss 
these objections consecutively, and show wherein they 
are wanting in veracity. 

4. ACTS OF THE APOSTLES — ANSWERS TO PRETENDED 

ERRORS. 

The errors which Rationalists pretend to discover 
in the Acts are the following: The author has deceived 
himself as to the date of Theudas, and about the cir- 
cumstances of the insurrection caused by an Egyptian; 
moreover, it is incredible, as St. Luke pretends, that 
St. Paul, when asked for the high priest at Jerusalem, 
ignored what was the dignity of the one before whom 
he had to' answer. 

Renan, speaking of St. Luke and the subject of the 
first objection, affirms without hesitation: " He com- 
mits errors of chronology. Before Judas, the Gaul- 
onite, the Acts place another agitator, called Theudas; 
but this is an anachronism; the movement of Theudas 
took place in the year 44 A. D." 



590 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Thus, according to Renan, St. Luke was certainly 
deceived. But behold the truth: Gamaliel, member of 
the Sanhedrim, in the discourse which he pronounced 
in favor of the apostles brought before the great Jewish 
council, says among other things, when referring to the 
different revolters: '' Before these days there has been a 
Theudas who believed himself something, and who had 
as followers about four hundred men; he was killed, and 
all those who had believed in him became dispersed, and 
were reduced to nothing. . After him arose Judas, the 
Galilean " (Acts v. 36-37). The latter is mentioned 
by Josephus in the same epoch as by Gamaliel (Jos. 
Jew. Anti., xviii, i) ; hence, one does not raise any objec- 
tion to this point, but it is not the same in the case 
of Theudas, of whom also the Pharisean orator speaks, 
according to the rationalistic critics. The Theudas 
mentioned by Gamaliel has lived at a date anterior to 
that of Judas the Galilean, for the revolter of this name, 
of whom there is question in the " Jewish Antiquities," 
and who must be one and the same person, as alleged 
by infidels, revolted only about ten years after the dis- 
course of Gamaliel, under Cuspius Fadus. Hence, 
there is an anachronism in the account of the Acts. 

If there is a contradiction here between the two his- 
torians on the date of a certain revolter, nothing obliges 
us to prefer Josephus to St. Luke. The former has 
often been found in error, and numerous inaccuracies 
have been established against him — even formal contra- 
dictions between his "Jewish Antiquities" and "War of 
the Jews," whilst the author of the Acts proves a won- 
derful exactitude in all parts of his account, which could 
be verified. In the present case, his testimony merits the 
fullest confidence, because he was the companion of St. 



THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES. 59 1 

Paul, who had been himself a disciple of GamaHel, orator 
of the Sanhedrim. But the point is not established at 
all that the Theudas of Josephus is the Theudas of St. 
Luke ; and we can without much difficulty, admit 
both accounts true. The name alone is common to both 
writers. Now, two revolters of the same name could 
very easily have raised disturbances within a few years. 
Even Josephus, since the death of Herod I, till the tak- 
ing of Jerusalem by Titus, mentions five conspirators 
by the name of Simon, and three by the name of Judas : 
Judas the Galilean, also called Gaulonite, of whom 
Gamaliel speaks; Judas son of Ezechias and Judas, son of 
Saphore. In spite of the considerable number of rebels, 
the remembrance of which the Jewish historian has 
preserved, it is quite probable he failed to enumerate 
all; therefore, in the present case, we have a per- 
fect right to reject the account of Josephus and accept 
that of St. Luke. But this conclusion may be further 
strengthened by referring to the epoch of which Gam- 
aliel speaks, and of which Josephus places the revolt of 
a certain Matthias (Anti. xvii, 6, 4). This Matthias 
might have been the Theudas or Theodas of St. Luke, 
for the names Matthias in Hebrew and Theodas 
(abridged from Theodoros) in the Greek, have the same 
meaning (Gift of God) ; therefore, the same person may 
have assumed both names, as it was quite customary 
among the Jews. 

Again, what is further said about an Egyptian is not 
erroneous. When St. Paul was led before the tribunal 
of Lysias, at Jerusalem, this person asked him: "Art 
thou not the Egyptian who before these days raised a 
revolt, and didst lead forth Into the desert four thousand 
men that were murderers? " (Acts xxi, 1-38). When 



592 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

St. Luke could have been exactly informed about the 
facts he relates, this was certainly the case with regard 
to the captivity of his master St. Paul. But Josephus 
fails to report this event in the same manner, whence it 
follows according to the critics, that the author of the 
Acts was certainly deceived. Unfortunately for their 
part, Josep'hus has twice related the revolt of the Egyp- 
tian, and both accounts widely differ. According to 
the '' War of the Jews " (ii, 8, 5), this foreigner making 
himself pass for a prophet, gathered 30,000 men and led 
them from the desert on Mount Olives, from where 
he threatened Jerusalem. The inhabitants of this city 
joined the Romans to combat him; the most of his fol- 
lowers perished or were captured; the others became 
dispersed; the leader himself took to flight. We find 
in the " Jewish Antiquities " (xx, 8-16), the Egyptian 
seduced the multitude and drew them along on Mount 
of Olives, with the promise that the walls of Jerusalem 
would fall before him. The Procurator Felix unmasked 
the false prophet, attacked him on Mount of Olives, 
killed four hundred of the rebels and made two hundred 
prisoners; their seducer succeeded in escaping. Here we 
find that the thirty thousand men led from the desert in 
one account have dwindled down to four hundred in 
the other account, and furthermore, that most of the 
thirty thousand perished or were made prisoners. 

The third objection which they find against the 
veracity of the Acts is made quite serious. When the 
high priest Ananias caused St. Paul to be beaten before 
the Sanhedrim, the apostle complained of being beaten 
contrary to law. The assistants cried out that he was 
wanting in respect to the high priest: " I know not " 
answered St. Paul " that he is the high priest " (Acts 



THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES. 593 

xxiii, 2-5). This is incredible! exclaim the infidels, St. 
Paul not knowing the high priest. Nothing, however, 
is more easy to explain: Ananias, son of Zebedee, exer- 
cised the sovereign priesthood of the council about the 
time St. Paul was arraigned, but he was deposed shortly 
afterward and sent a prisoner to Rome by Quadratus, 
legate of Syria (Anti. xx, 5-2). Claudius granted right 
to Ananias, consequently, they had to give him his 
liberty, but during his absence one was put in his place; 
Jonathan, his successor, was killed by order of Felix, 
before the revolt of the Egyptian, and before the arrest 
of St. Paul. At the moment when the apostle was 
brought before him, the sovereign pontiff was without 
title (Anti. viii, 5-8). Ananias in the quality of ancient 
high priest, fulfilled certain functions of the priesthood 
during the vacancy, which explains to us why he pre- 
sided over the Sanhedrim, and also why the apostle 
ignored he was high priest. Indeed, he was not the 
high priest, properly speaking. St. Paul, without dis- 
cussing his title, had a perfect right to say he did not 
know he was speaking to the pontiff. 

To explain in a natural manner the origin of Chris- 
tianity, infidels assert that the Acts are partial writings, 
composed with the view of reconciling and uniting the 
two opposed factions, which sprung up among the dis- 
ciples of Christ regarding Peter and Paul. 

In answer to this charge we can say that the author 
of the Acts did not seek to alter the truth in order to 
reconcile the followers of Peter with those of Paul. 
So little did he think of setting ofif the apostolate of St. 
Paul at the expense of historic exactitude, that he him- 
self furnishes the strongest argument one could allege 
against his mission, if it had been " contested," as 

D. B.-38 



594 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

modern infidels afiirm. Indeed, St. Luke relates that 
immediately after the Ascension, when there was a 
question to complete the ApostoUc College, and to 
choose a new member to replace Judas Iscariot, St. Peter 
indicated beforehand, as a condition of the choice to be 
made, that the elected must have accompanied the 
Saviour since the baptism of John until the Ascension 
(Acts i, 2i). St. Paul did not fulfill this condition. 
Later on, after his conversion, the Acts report again 
that Peter, in another discourse, calls " preordained 
witnesses of the Resurrection of Christ," those who did 
eat and drink with Jesus risen, a necessary condition for 
election. Surely, nothing obliged St. Luke to record 
these words in his writings; manifestly a desire to re- 
late the truth in all its details was the motive which 
prompted him. 

It was far from St. Luke's thoughts to flatter the 
Judaizers with the view of reconciling them with the 
other followers, or to bring them to an understand- 
ing with one another. He reminds us continually of 
the stubborness of the Jews, which he certainly would 
have avoided if he had at heart these sentiments, falsely 
attributed to him. Already St. Peter, in his first dis- 
courses, reproaches the Jews for what they had done 
against the Saviour (Acts ii, 23). St. Stephen 
treats them as stifif-necked, uncircumcised in heart, 
and ears that always resist the Holy Ghost (Acts vii, 
51, 53). St. Paul himself applies to them the words of 
Isaias: ''The heart of this people is grown gross, and 
with their ears have heard heavily, and their eyes they 
have shut, lest perhaps they should see with their eyes 
and hear with their ears, and understand with their 
heart, and should be converted " (Acts xxviii, 2J). 



ST. PAUL'S EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS. 595 

How can one maintain that a writing which has so little 
consideration for the Jews, and which reproaches them 
for their obstinacy and prejudice, is a book of recon- 
ciliation, an instrument designed to bring on the Juda- 
izers to the ideas of St. Paul? 



CHAPTER LXI. 



ST. PAUL'S EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS. 

THE authenticity of the Epistle of St. Paul to the 
Galatians is not questioned by anybody, but the 
rationalistic criticism seeks to exploit it in order to 
break down the Acts of the Apostles. We will show 
that there exists no contradiction between the Acts of 
the Apostles and the Epistle to the Galatians, after 
having estabHshed first that the Cephas, whom St. Paul 
resists, according to the account he makes to the Gala- 
tians, is really the Apostle St. Peter, although some 
CathoHc commentators maintain the contrary. 

I. THE CEPHAS OF THE EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS. 

St. Paul, in speaking of a personage whom he calls 
Cephas, relates in the Epistle to the Galatians that he 
"withstood him to his face" Gal. ii, ii). ThisCephus must 
have had a real importance, because the apostle of the 
nations, whose zeal knew no obstacles, quoted as an ex- 
ample of energy the fact of his having resisted him. Also, 
the most of the Fathers and commentators have believed 



596 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

at all times that this personage was no other than St. 
Peter, whose Aramean name was, indeed, Cephas. 
Nevertheless, since St. Paul writes that he not only 
''withstood him to the face," but that he resisted to him 
" because he was to be blamed," there have been for a 
long time interpreters who cannot beUeve that the 
Cephas was the chief of the Church, and they maintain 
that he is one of the seventy-two disciples. The 
Rationalists, in agreement this time with the majority 
of Catholics, on the contrary, do not doubt that Cephas 
is Peter. In our opinion it is the only interpretation 
which can be defended, and we do not hesitate to 
acknowledge it. During the first six centuries of the 
Church, all the writers who occupied themselves with 
this question have recognized St. Peter in the Cephas 
of the Epistle to the Galatians, with the exception of 
Clement of Alexandria in a work without historical 
value, and the falsifier who has manufactured, under the 
name of Dorotheus of Tyre, the apocryphal catalogue 
of the disciples of the Saviour. The scholastics have 
not believed otherwise than the Fathers. During the 
whole Middle Age, we do not rheet with one single 
writer who does not identify with St. Peter the Cephas 
of the Epistle to the Galatians. 

The disciple Cephas finds only adherents after the 
rise of Protestantism. The Catholics then had to defend 
against the new heretics the infallibility and the dignity 
of St. Peter. Several among them believed that the 
best means to justify the chief of the Church in this cir- 
cumstance was to maintain that there was not question 
of St. Peter; but the most prudent and most circum- 
spect were very careful to claim for their opinions only 
a pure probability. 



ST. PAUL'S EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS. 59/ 

As to the infallibility of the Pope, it does not enter 
more into question than the veracity of the Acts of the 
Apostles. There was no discord of doctrine, but 
only of conduct between St. Peter and St. Paul. 
The Council of Jerusalem had decided that the con- 
verted pagans were not obliged to submit to circum- 
cision, and to legal observances; it prescribed nothing 
as to the subject of the Jewish-Christians. Hence, these 
preserved their freedom. They were free to continue 
the observance of the law, because it was difficult to 
break all at once with long established customs, and 
those among them who lived in Judea beheved it expe- 
dient to follow the social, religious and civil customs. 
It was with this motive that St. Paul caused his disciple 
Timothy to be circumcised. The synagogue should be 
buried with honor. But although it was permitted to 
the Jewish-Christians to submit themselves to the legal 
prescriptions, they were not obliged to do so. Where 
the Hellenist element dominated in the new Church, 
the result of the Council of Jerusalem must have been 
the prompt abandonment of the Mosaic observances. 
It was this that took place at Antioch. As the pagan 
converts here formed the majority, the Jewish-Chris- 
tians among them soon abandoned the Jewish cus- 
toms. 

In this state of things it is quite natural that St. 
Peter, on his arrival at the capital of Syria, lived there 
with the Christians, who, contrary to the Jewish cus- 
toms, had not been circumcised, and had with them the 
relations which he had already formed with the centu- 
rion Cornelius. That he did this is evidenced in the 
Epistle to the Galatians. St. Paul lived like the Jews 
at Jerusalem (I Cor. ix, 20, etc.). St. Peter lived like 



598 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

the Gentiles at Antioch. But an unforeseen incident 
came to trouble the harmony. Jewish-Christians 
having arrived h*om Palestine in Antioch, St. Peter 
found himself in great embarrassment. There are situ- 
ations where it is very difificult to determine immediately 
which is the best course to follow. No question of 
principles was at stake; faith was not at all interested, 
and nevertheless to decide what action to take was very 
difficult. The newcomers, accustomed to observe the 
law in Palestine, did not wish, according to the Jewish 
custom, to eat with the noncircumcised Christians, and, 
as we have seen, they had a right to act thus. If St. 
Peter did not imitate them, he offended his brethren 
of Jerusalem; if he ceased to eat with the noncircum- 
cised, he wounded the new Christians of pagan origin. 
What alternative was the better? How remedy the 
difficulty? Both sides had claims which must be re- 
spected. St. Peter was charged with the Gospel of the 
circumcision. In the fear undoubtedly that the Jewish- 
Christians would deny him in all Palestine, and cause 
him to lose, by accusing him to be lacking of respect for 
the law, the esteem he stood in need of in order to estab- 
lish the faith with success among his brethren, the chief 
of the apostles decided to separate himself from his 
noncircumcised brethren and to live anew as a Jew, i. e., 
as a Jewish-Christian. Did he thus commit an error of 
doctrine? Certainly not. No point of faith was en- 
dangered. Had he the right to act as he did? Un- 
questionably, because the Council of Jerusalem had not 
affirmed, in this regard, any line of conduct. Jew by 
birth, he was authorized to observe the law, as St. Paul 
did himself when he was at Jerusalem. He merely fol- 
lowed the course which presented the least inconven- 



ST. PAUL'S EPISTLE TO THE GALATL\NS. 599 

ience. But by choosing thus, was it the best course, 
to avoid scandaUzing the Jewish-Christians? 

St. Paul did not think so. Every converted Jew 
had the right to observe the law, but St. Peter was the 
chief of the Church and, on account of the high dignity, 
his example had particular weight. His conduct would 
give the impression that the legal ceremonies of the 
Jews were always rigorously obligatory and not simply 
optional. These consequences followed immediately. 
All the converted Jews of the capital of Syria, Barnabas 
himself, the companion of St. Paul, considered it their 
duty to imitate St. Peter. The importance attached 
to his conduct, the influence which it exerted, pro- 
claims very well that it was not the act of an unknown 
disciple, but of the prince of the apostles. Hence its 
great importance. If Cephas were merely a disciple 
he would not have commanded this attention. But 
being St. Peter, the consequences were pernicious: he 
disturbed the harmony which reigned in the Christian 
community of Antioch. The converted pagans who 
were the most numerous, found themselves as if excom- 
municated, and by their own bishop. St. Peter did not 
dare any longer to have relations with them. They 
complained and blamed St. Peter: this is the meaning of 
the Greek text, which has not, like the Vulgate, that 
Cephas was ''' blamable," but that he was " blamed." 
Then St. Paul undertook their defence publicly, '* to 
the face," not in secret, because it was only a public 
act that could cease the division introduced at Antioch. 
In his Epistle, he designates the conduct of the chief of 
the apostles with '^ dissimulation," wishing to show 
thereby that St. Peter, although he knew he could have 
relations with noncircumcised, deprived himself thereof 



600 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

as if he had no right to do so. However, St. Paul did not 
contest that the Jewish-Christians could legitimately 
live as Jews, but he demanded that the converted Gen- 
tiles be not rejected and oppressed. The chief of the 
Church recognized the justness of the claim. He be- 
held the consequences of his conduct and, undoubtedly, 
proclaimed openly that it was permitted to all to have 
relations with the Hellenist-Christians. 

Such is the episode of Antioch; such is the expla- 
nation of the account of the Epistle to the Galatians. 
St. Peter did not err at all in the doctrine; his pontifical 
infallibility does not enter the question; only he adopted 
a line of conduct which led to irregularities; the mistake 
was pointed out by vSt. Paul and humbly acknowledged 
by St. Peter. The humility of the prince of the apostles 
had its good results; it was decisive; it put an end to 
all the difficulties which, without the circumstance 
would have often been renewed. The ensemble and the 
details of the conflict, far from being irreconcilable with 
the dignity of the Head of the Church, on the contrary, 
increased his authority and power. They show the im- 
portance of his position. All is explained easily, when 
there is question of the first Pope; all is unintelligible, 
when applied to an obscure disciple, called Cephas. St. 
Paul considers his action as one of courage; he has pre- 
sumed to advise his hierarchical superior, as St. Bernard 
will, later on in his book " On Consideration," give 
advice to Pope Eugen IH; but even St. Paul's language 
implies the primacy of Peter, instead of denying it as 
the Protestants deny. The former has said, in advance 
of the passage in discussion (Gal. i, i8), that he went 
to Jerusalem to see Peter, or, as the Greek text has it, 
Cephas, whom he tluis considers as his chief. When 



ST. PAUL'S EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS. 60I 

St. Paul resists him, it is not to disown his authority. 
On the contrary, the language of St. Paul, understood 
correctly, precious in proportion to its indirectness, 
is an homage rendered to the primacy of the Holy See. 
The Epistle to the Galatians does not contain, there- 
fore, any attack on the power of St. Peter. We will 
now show that it is not at all in contradiction with the 
Acts of the Apostles. 

CONFORMITY OF THE EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS 
WITH THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES. 

Objection is made, in the first place, to the exacti- 
tude of the narrative of the iVcts, where St. Paul in his 
Epistle to the Galatians relates the dissent that took 
place between the Christians of Jewish origin and 
those of Pagan origin in quite another manner than 
St. Luke. We have two versions, it is said, of the same 
fact, and these two versions are in contradiction. 
Which is the true one? Evidently that of St. Paul who 
has been, so intimately connected with the quarrel, and 
who played the chief role therein. 

It is certain that St. Paul, in the second chapter of 
his Epistle to the Galatians, alludes to several facts 
which St. Luke relates in the Acts, but there exists no 
contradiction between the two sacred writers. Only 
St. Luke, writing a history, presents the events as an 
historian, stating the origin of the quarrel, its diverse 
peripetiae and its conclusion, while the apostle of the 
nations, addressing a letter to the Galatians with a 
quite determined object, refers to these events only in 
so far as it is necessary and useful to his purpose. In 
both accounts, Peter and James maintain the right of 
St. Paul (Acts XV, 7-10; 13-21; Gal. ii, 9); this is the 



602 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

fundamental feature. The rest is accessory and without 
consequence. St. Paul writes to the Galatians that he 
had gone to Jerusalem '' by revelation " (Gal. ii, 2), that 
is, by order of God, whilst, according to St. Luke, 
this apostle was sent on a mission (Acts xv, 2) into the 
capital of Judea by the faithful of Antioch. They desire 
to see in this a contradiction. In reality there is none. 
Whatever the precise sense may be of the Greek original, 
interpreters are not agreed, but it is certain that St. 
Paul means to say that he went to Jerusalem in obe- 
dience to the will of God, which does not contradict at 
all the account of the Acts. The latter, speaking of 
the council, enters into details which St. Paul omits, 
because he does not need to speak of them, but both 
affirm in the same way that the Apostles gave right to 
the preacher of the nations, and this is the sole essential 
point. 

The rationalistic critic pretends to discover an- 
other contradiction between the Acts and the Epistle 
of St. Paul. St. Luke says that the apostle passed only 
through Galatia (Acts xvi, 6; xviii, 23); the apostle 
himself, by his letter, proves that he sojourned for a long 
time in these countries. 

The contradiction is only an apparent one. Renan 
himself ('* St. Paul," p. 51) has proved that it is only in the 
terminology, and that both accounts agree perfectly in 
meaning. '*' Paul," he says, " was in the habit of desig- 
nating each country by the administrative name. Asia, 
Macedonia, Achaia, in his terminology refer to the 
provinces which were so called, and not the countries 
thus named before. The countries which he had 
evangelized from Antioch in Pisidia until Derbe, was 
called by him Galatia; the Christians of this country 



ST. PAUL'S EPISTLE TO THE GALATL\NS. 603 

were for him the Galatians. By this we can explain 
that unique peculiarity of the Epistle to the Galatians. 
that it is not addressed to a particular Church. By this 
we can also explain one of the apparent singularities of 
the life of St. Paul. The Epistle to the Galatians sup- 
poses that St. Paul makes among those to whom this 
letter is addressed a long sojourn; that he had with 
them intimate relations, at least was as intimate with 
them as with the Corinthians and Thessalonians. Now, 
properly speaking, the Acts do not mention the 
evangelization of Galatia. In a second voyage, Paul 
passes tJiroiigJi the country of Galatia. St. Luke 
understands by this Galatia a distinct place, which he 
distinguishes from Pisidia (Acts xvi, 6; xiv, 23) and 
from Lycaonia (xiv, 6), whilst St. Paul understood by 
the name Galatia '' an artificial agglomeration, corre- 
sponding to the transient reunion of provinces which had 
been formed by the Galatian King Amyntas. This per- 
sonage after the battle of the Phillipians and the death 
of Dejotar, received from Antonius, Pisidia, then Gala- 
tia, with a portion of Lyconia and Pamphylia. 
All these countries, at his death, formed one sole Roman 
province. The province which bore the name of Gala- 
tia in the official nomenclature, at least under the Greek 
Caesars, comprised therefore, certainly: i. Galatia proper- 
ly speaking: 2. Lycaonia; 3. Pisidia, etc." (Renan, '' St. 
Paul " pp. 48-49). St. Luke and St. Paul do not, there- 
fore, contradict themselves; their apparent divergency 
is even a proof of the perfect exactitude of both, because 
both express themselves in a very correct manner, 
although in a different way. 



CHAPTER LXII. 



ST. PAUVS EPISTLES TO THE THESSALONIANS. 

THE authenticity of St. Paul's Epistles to the Thessa- 
lonians had never been contested until Christian 
Schmid came to the fore with objections in 1804. His 
attacks, however, were unnoticed until the epoch when 
his opinion was embraced by Bauer's school. Bauer 
rejected the two Epistles to the Thessalonians. How- 
ever, not all his disciples did follow^ him on this ground; 
the most even admitted the authenticity of the first 
letter to the Thessalonians, and to-day they limit them- 
selves to a denial of the second. But the Paulinian 
origin of neither can be seriously contested. The Mu- 
ratorian Canon expressly names the two Epistles to the 
Thessalonians. St. Irenseus often quotes them in Gaul, 
Tertullian in Africa, and Clement of Alexandria in 
Egypt, so that at the end of the second century the 
belief of the entire Church was unanimous in regard to 
these letters. 

The two Epistles to the Thessalonians are attacked 
for doctrinal reasons. **' The sole serious objection 
which had been raised against the Epistle to the Thessa- 
lonians," says Renan, " derives itself from the theory of 
the '' Antichrist " exposed in the second chapter of the 
second letter to the Thessalonians, . . . but this 

objection can be answered," The ideas here developed 
(604) 



ST. PAUL'S EPISTLES TO THE THESSALONIANS. 605 

by St. Paul are found indeed in his other letters. The 
two Epistles to the Thessalonians are the most ancient 
in date. They were written before the Epistles to the 
Corinthians and to the Galatians. The subject treated 
therein by the apostle, is among others the resurrec- 
tion of the dead. He returns to this in writing to the 
Corinthians (I Cor. xv.). Hence this thought was 
familiar to him. Several features we meet in the Epis- 
tles to the Thessalonians are also met in the pictures, 
which St. Luke, his Evangelist, forms in describing the 
last arrival of the Saviour. The second Epistle to the 
Thessalonians adds another particular, that of the 
apostasy which will take place at the end of time, but 
the same idea is found in St. Luke (xvii, 8); hence 
we can find no evidence in this against the authenticity 
of the epistle. 

We must remark, however, that which St. Paul 
writes about the coming of our Lord furnishes grounds 
for a difficulty not so easily answered; not in regard to 
the authenticity of his letters, but as to the idea which 
the apostle had of the coming of the Saviour. This 
difficulty applies itself particularly to the Epistle to the 
Thessalonians; it is also found in other epistles. But, 
say the Rationalists, the apostles and Jesus Christ Him- 
self, at least by intervals, believed that the events of the 
Last Judgment would be near. " The words of Jesus," 
says Renan, '^ could not give rise to any difficulty." But 
our Saviour expressly declared that His Father alone 
knew the hour of the Last Judgment. — What He had 
announced as near at hand, and that would occur before 
the present generation had passed away, was the ruin 
of Jerusalem, which was accomplished as He had fore- 
told. 



6o6 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

But had the apostles not misunderstood the Master? 
Jesus having spoken after the fashion of the prophets 
who did not distinguish the epochs in their oracles of 
the future, and who did not mark with precision the 
chronological succession of time, did His disciples not 
suppose that what should take place long afterwards 
was really at hand? Did not St. Paul in particular 
believe that he would see with his mortal eyes, before 
his death, the triumphal arrival of the Saviour, when he 
wrote to the Thessalonians: '' This we say unto you in 
the words of the Lord, that we who are alive, who 
remain unto the coming of our Lord shall not prevent 
them who have slept? " (Thess. iv, 14.) These words 
so similar to many others we read in the New Testa- 
ment, have appeared so decisive to a great number of 
Protestants, that they believed St. Paul was in error in 
regard to the epoch of the second coming of Jesus 
Christ, and that he really believed the end of all things 
earthly was at hand. 

We have to admit that the expressions of St. Paul 
can be understood in this sense, and the proof for this 
is that, among the Thessalonians, there were many who 
so understood him, because the apostle explains to them 
in his second epistle, and declares that another mean- 
ing must be attached to his words (Cf. ii, Thess. ii, 1-2). 
But we have to add that it was by taking these words 
detached, without keeping account of the context, that 
the Thessalonians interpreted falsely the first epistle, on 
account of the natural fear which the thought of the ap- 
proachment of the judgment of God has always pro- 
duced. The human mind easily adopts the interpreta- 
tions of this kind. But what the apostle said, a little 
further on, clearly proclaims that he did not believe the 



ST. PAUL'S EPISTLES TO THE THESSALONIANS. 607 

second coming of the Saviour at hand. '' But of the 
times and moments, brethren, you need not that we 
should write to you, for yourselves know perfectly that 
the day of the Lord shall come, as a thief in the night " 
(I Thess. V, 1-2). Thus he recalls to their mind the same 
words of our Lord, as given in the Gospels (Mat. xxiv, 
43; Luke xii, 49). Hence, St. Paul does not retract in 
the second Epistle to the Thessalonians what he had 
written in the first. It was only by not paying atten- 
tion to what he had said of the incertitude of the 
moment when the Lord will come that one could mis- 
understand him. In several of his epistles he supposes 
that he will not live until the return of the Saviour: 
" I desire to be dissolved, and to be with Christ," he 
writes to the Phillipians (Phil, i, 23). In the first Epis- 
tle to the Thessalonians, we read nothing of the con- 
trary. It is only in taking the pronoun " we " at the 
foot of the letter that one can attach to it a false mean- 
ing. The most of the Fathers of the Church have seen 
with right in this expression a change of mode of 
person; he does not designate himself by this word, but 
the faithful who will live in the epoch of the coming of 
our Lord. ^' He does not say zve of himself," remarks 
St. John Chrysostom, '' for he should not live until the 
resurrection, but he understands thereby the faithful." 
(Hom. vii, 2, in I Thess. vol. Ixii). 



CHAPTER LXIII. 



PASTORAL EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. 

THE authenticity of the Pastoral Epistles of St. 
Paul, that is of his two letters to Timothy and 
that to Titus, has been universally accepted until our 
century. At the beginning of this century some 
rejected the first Epistle to Timothy, under pretext 
that it was in part manufactured from, and was an imi- 
tation of, the other pastoral epistles which they admitted 
as authentic. In our days the Rationalists have gone 
further: they have rejected the three letters entire. 

According to these the Epistles to Titus and 
Timothy are not and cannot be authentic, because they 
speak of the ecclesiastical hierarchy which could not yet 
have existed in the time of the apostle of the Gentiles. 
Their whole system attempts to place the origin of 
Christianity within the course of a progressive and 
natural solution; the organization of the Church was the 
w^ork of time and not that of Jesus Christ and the apos- 
tles. As these epistles demolish the rationalistic thesis, 
Bauer and his followers are under the necessity of rele- 
gating them to the second century. However, his- 
tory will not conform itself to rationalistic systems 
a priori; it is for the systems not to contradict history. 
Eusebius of Csesarea counts the three Pastoral Epistles 
among the writings of the New Testament, which are 
accepted by all without dispute. Before him Pope 
(608) 



PASTORAL EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. 609 

^f Qf P^iil had made about 
riement contemporary of bt. t^aui, nau u 
l^Xnusions t'o them n. his first l-ter to t e Co - 
thians. St. Ignatius, martyr and St. Poly<=f-P ~ 
them equally well. It is useless to quote further 
%Z names are sufficient guarantee of the ant.qmty of 

^'^TtTtte'o^SSons alleged against their authen 
ticitt 4ey consist in picking out from them pretended 
Srical errors. The pr.napal groun s for object, n 
are thus stated: "The orgamzation of the Churc'ies, 
he hierarchy, the presbyterial and eFSCopal power are 
n^uch more developed than it is P-f le to suppo e 
them in the last years of St. Paul's hfe. - It is easy to 
answe" his assertion: It is true that the Pastoral Epis- 
r suppose that there are, in the_ Christian commu 
ties, bishops, priests and deacons; ^t ;s true that one o 
the chief injunctions in the letters to Timothy and Titu 
recommends them to intrust to worthy pastors the care 
of souls, and to instruct the pastors as to their duties 
but this can be easily understood. The apostles could 
not be without help and colaborers. They also needed 
successors. Timothy and Titus were the auxiliaries 
of the first disciples of the Saviour; they were mneed 
of help in their turn, and as the choice of the ministers 
of the Church is of the highest importance, St. Faui 
counsels them on this grave matter. What is more 
natural? Even if no testimony had made known to us 
the existence of this organization, it is indispensable^ 
so evident, that it must result from the necessity which 
Christianitv had for chiefs to thrive and P^rpetna e 
itself —But besides this reason, drawn from the very 
nature of things, we have positive evidence which con- 
firms the truth of all that is stated in the Pastoral Let 



D. B.— 39 



6lO DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

ters. Ill the Epistle to Titus the establishment of the 
priesthood is especially recommended for the city of 
Crete (I Tit. i, 5, 7). It is the same thing we read in the 
Acts of the Apostles, namely, that St. Paul established 
priests (bishops) in each Church (Acts xiv, 22). The 
author of the first Epistle to Timothy writes: " Neglect 
not the grace that is in thee which was given thee with 
imposition of the hands of the priesthood " (I Tim. iv, 
14). One cannot pretend the imposition of the hands 
was unknown in the Apostolic Age, because in the Acts 
of the Apostles, we also behold an assembly of prophets 
and doctors who impose the hands on Paul and Barna- 
bas (Acts xiii, 1-3). 

The Pastoral Epistles mention also the deacons. 
The institution of the deacons is expressly mentioned 
in the Acts; hence, it cannot offer, and does not offer, 
indeed, any difficulty of correct interpretation. The 
epistle .was written, therefore, in the time of the apos- 
tles, when deacons, priests, and bishops had been estab- 
lished, and whatever may be said to the contrary, the 
ecclesiastical body is of apostolic origin. This is a 
demonstrated historical fact. It is undeniable that in 
the second century the ecclesiastical hierarchy was 
solidly established in Asia, Italy, Greece, Gaul, and 
Africa. In all these countries, at the head of the 
churches, are priests placed under the government of a 
bishop: all the ancient monuments unanimously attest 
to this. Thus we find the sacred hierarchy established 
everywhere; we do not see its rise anywhere. When one 
seeks to discover where, and in what epoch, this organ- 
ization originated, and what were the conditions of its 
early progress, he will find his efforts barren of results. 
This proves that it is as old as the Church itself, and that 



PASTORAL EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. 6ll 

it is the work of the apostles. Nobody dare deny that St. 
James, the brother of St. Jude, was bishop of Jerusalem. 

The Epistles of St. Paul least objected to allude to 
the origin concerning the ecclesiastical hierarchy. The 
apostle does not forget the gift of government in the 
enumeration of the gifts of the Holy Ghost (I Cor. xii, 
7- to). The Epistle to the Ephesians speaks expressly 
of '* pastors," in the same time when it speaks of the 
apostles and doctors (Ephes. iv, 11). The consecration 
of bread and wine mentioned in the first Epistle to the 
Corinthians (I Cor. xi, 23-26; Cf. x, 16-17), implies the 
existence of a consecrator, that is, of a priesthood. The 
Epistle to the Hebrews, which is certainly anterior to 
the Pastoral Epistles, speaks of the Christian priesthood 
(Pleb. iv, 11). 

The Apocalypse which dates from the last years of 
the first century (95), and which, even according to the 
infidels, embraces the year 68, shows us seven bishops 
presiding over the seven churches of Asia Minor of 
which it speaks. Therefore, the ecclesiastical hierarchy 
existed at that time. The letter of St. Clement to the 
Corinthians, composed undoubtedly about the end of 
the first century, between the years 91 and no, clearly 
supposes the existence of the hierarchy, and it speaks 
of it as of an institution known by all the Christians and, 
consequently, already ancient. St. Clement, twenty 
years at most, after the death of St. Paul, reproaches 
the Corinthians for having driven away their bishop to 
replace him by another, and he says in distinctive terms 
that the bishops have been established by the apostles. 
The one who expresses himself thus is a Pope. Hence, 
we have here all the degrees of the hierarchical order in 
the first century of the Church. 



6l2 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

The rationalistic critics also pretend that the 
widows of which there is mention in the first Epistle to 
Timothy (I Tim. v, 9-16) did not become ecclesiastical 
auxiliaries until the second century. This assertion is 
false. The first Epistle to the Corinthians speaks of 
certain women who exercised in the Church a ministry 
of charity (I Cor. ix, 5). St. Paul names Phebe, deacon- 
ess of the Church of Cenchrea. The institution, already 
established in 56 or 57, naturally developed itself, and, 
about 64 or 66, in his first Epistle to Timothy, the apos- 
tle speaks of Christian widows, forming a kind of char- 
itable association (I Tim. v, 9-16). Such progress 
was conformable to the nature of things. The existence 
in the first age of the Church, of the organization which 
the Pastoral Epistles refer to is therefore historically 
established. 

Diverse critics, contending against the authenticity 
of these writings, assert that the letters to Timothy 
and Titus contain many passages which are discordant 
with the doctrine and character of St. Paul. This alle- 
gation is false. The Apostle St. Paul speaks of Jesus 
Christ (Tit. iii, 11-14) in the same manner in the Epis- 
tles to the Corinthians, to the Galatians, and to the 
Romans, and there do not exist, in regard to this most 
important subject, any contradictory passages in the 
different letters of the great apostle. 

They object in particular against the Epistle to 
Titus in regard to what it contains on the subject of 
heresies. This language, they say, is suspicious. But 
why? Is it because the heresies did not yet begin to raise 
their head? The proof that they are almost as ancient 
as the Church itself, is that the first Epistle to the Cor- 
inthians mentions them already. 



PASTORAL EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. 613 

Finally, the Rationalists attack the Pastoral Letters 
by affirming that they contain falsehoods. The apostle 
has not done, and even he could not do, what they sup- 
pose. — What is impossible or apocryphal in their con- 
tent? Let us examine them. The second letter to 
Timothy speaks of different voyages of St. Paul: they 
are quite in agreement with what we know of him. 
Neither do we read anything in his Pastoral Letters 
that is in contradiction with his character. 

They raise against the Pastoral Epistles a last diffi- 
culty drawn from the epoch of their composition. The 
first to Timothy and that to Titus have been written 
between the first and second captivity of St. Paul; the 
second to Timothy was written during the imprison- 
ment which preceded the martyrdom of the apostle; 
none of them can be anterior to the first imprisonment. 
From this the criticism concludes that they are all 
apocryphal, because, according to this, St. Paul was a 
prisoner only once, when he was brought from Pales- 
tine to Rome, as the Acts relate. 

This objection has something surprising. One must 
have colossal audacity to deny a fact so well authenti- 
cated by history as that of the double captivity of St. 
Paul. Pope St. Clement, who was his disciple, distinct- 
ly affirms that the apostle had carried the Gospel unto 
the extremities of the Occident, which he could have 
done only after having been liberated from his first Im- 
prisonment. The fragment of Muratori equally relates 
that St. Paul went to preach In Spain: "After having 
pleaded his cause (Paul) departed anew for the ministry 
of preaching as related, and after a second visit to the 
same city (of Rome), he ended there his life by martyr- 
dom." Therefore, the apostle could write to Timothy, 



6l4 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

when he was imprisoned for the second time in Rome. 
All that we read in the Pastoral Epistles is so befitting 
to St. Paul that even those who deny their authenticity 
are compelled to admit that " the Paulinian tradition 
affu'ms itself with vigor, and this is a point acknowl- 
edged by everybody," says A. Sabatier. 



CHAPTER LXIV. 



THE EPISTLES OF ST. JOHN. 

TPIE first Epistle of St. John is similar to the preface 
of his Gospel. The relations between these two 
writings are so intimate that they would be sufficient 
to establish the authenticity of the latter, even if tra- 
dition was dumb on the subject. Tradition is, how- 
ever, anything but silent in its testimony: Papias, St. 
Polycarp, St. Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, Ter- 
tullian, St. Cyprian, leave us no doubt as to the authen- 
ticity of this letter, and in antiquity not one contrary 
opinion existed. In our days certain adventurous 
minds tried nevertheless to raise some doubts, by sup- 
porting themselves upon intrinsic evidence. They 
accuse it of having neither a personal nor local charac- 
ter, and they suppose that it might have been written 
by a writer who had tried to imitate the style of the 
fourth Gospel; but this accusation, had it any founda- 
tion, would prove nothing, for the epistle is not ad- 
dressed to any church nor to a definite person, as are the 



THE EPISTLES OF ST. JOHN. 615 

Epistles of St. Paul. It is generally admitted that the 
objections formulated against the first Epistle of St. 
John are insignificant and without value. 

The second and third epistles have not in favor of 
their authenticity such decisive intrinsic proofs as the 
first, which can be understood without difficulty, on 
account of their brevity and of their subject; the testi- 
monies are nevertheless more than sufficient to establish 
their origin. In the fifth century, there was scarcely 
any doubt on this subject. In the fourth century, St. 
Ephrem attributes them to St. John. Aurelius does 
the same in 256, at the Council of Carthage, as well 
as St. Irenaeus about the year 200, in his refutation of 
the heresies. About 250, Dionysius and about 300 
Alexander of Alexandria, acknowledge them also as 
being of St. John. 

The intrinsic examination of the two last letters of 
St. John is conclusively in favor of their authenticity. 
The title is not that which a forger would have in- 
vented. The general tone, style, and thoughts are the 
same as in the first epistle. Of the thirteen verses of 
which the second is composed, there are eight of them 
which are found about the same as in the first. " The 
identity of the author is generally admitted; they form 
an intimate family, an original group, in the bosom of 
the apostolic literature. Christianity appears therein 
elevated ... to a height, where all the contrasts 
confound themselves in the unity of one spiritualism 
. . . of an incomparable serenity " (A. Sabatier, in 
the " Encyclopedic des Sciences," vol. vii, p. 177). In 
reading these epistles, the mind reverts to the paintings 
of the Catacombs, which breathe only peace and tran- 
quility, the ideas of which were derived in part from the 



6l6 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

Gospel of St. John. The faithful are represented there 
under the form of doves who are nourished by the gifts 
of the Lord with joy and love. The beloved apostle 
appears to us in his letters, as well as in the picture he 
has traced of the Divine Master, the type of these sweet 
doves, so dear to our fathers in faith. 



CHAPTER LXV. 



THE EPISTLE OF ST. JAMES. 

IN THE famous passage where he enumerates the 
writings of the New Testament, Eusebius of 
Csesarea ranks the Epistle of St. James in the category 
of those which are " contested " (H. E. iii, 25). ^' The 
first of the epistles called CathoUc," he says, '' is attrib- 
uted to St. James. One must know that it is looked 
upon as doubtful, because few ancients make mention 
thereof, just as that which is attributed to St. Jude, 
and which is also one of the seven Catholic Epistles. 
We know nevertheless that these two letters are read in 
most of the Churches with the others " (H. E. ii, 23). 
Luther termed the Epistle of St. James a '' Straw Epis- 
tle." We do not need to tell that the RationaHsts of 
our day deny its authenticity. 

In spite of the doubts of Eusebius and the nega- 
tions of the contemporary critics, the ancient tradition 
is in favor of the canonicity, and of the authenticity of 
the Epistle of St. James. Everybody acknowledges 



THE EPISTLE OF ST. JAMES. 617 

that Pope St. Clement has repeatedly made allusion to 
it, at the end of the first century, in his letter to the 
Corinthians. Hermas in the '' Pastor," reproduces 
from it almost word for word live verses and inspired 
himself with about ten others. The Syriac version 
known under the name of Peshito, which omits the 
short Catholic Epistles, has preserved nevertheless that 
of St. James, and assigns to it the name of this apostle. 
Now, this version goes back to the most remote an- 
tiquity. 

The intrinsic examination of the letter confirms the 
testimony of tradition. ^' Everything agrees," says 
Mgr. Ginouilhiac, '' with the state of the Christianity of 
Jerusalem in the last years of St. James. As St. James 
was much respected by the Jew^s, the faithful were left 
in peace. But, in the bosom of the Church, the minds 
became agitated; two sorts of false doctors had arisen 
therein; the one who exalted beyond measure the im- 
portance of the law, the others who, under pretext of 
evangelical liberty, despised not only the legal obser- 
vations, but counted for little the duties of the moral 
law, especially those who had for object the fraternal 
charity and its works. Among the latter, as at the first, 
the greatest number were proud and haughty men, and 
this was considered as wisdom. It was against these 
vices that the epistle is directed. It has for object to 
unmask these false doctors and to give an idea of the 
true Christian wisdom " (Ginoulhlac, " Les Origines du 
Christianisme," 1878, vol. i, p. 145). 

" The Epistle of St. James," says Renan, " is by far 
the best written work of the New Testament; the Greek 
thereof is pure and almost classic. . . . The pro- 
duction agrees perfectly with the character of St. James. 



6l8 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

The author is a Jewish rabbi; he holds strongly to the 
law; to designate the reunion of the faithful, he makes 
use of the word synagogue; his epistle resembles by the 
text, the Synoptic Gospels which we behold later on 
going forth from the Christian family of which James 
had been the chief. . . . When he speaks of humil- 
ity, patience, mercy, etc., James seems to have kept in 
memory the correct words of Jesus " (E. Renan, 
'' L'Antichrist," p. 47). The contents of the letter are, 
therefore, in accord with the general doctrine, which 
attributes it to the first bishop of Jerusalem. 

According to the Rationalists this epistle is directed 
partly against Paul and in contradiction with the doc- 
triae of the great apostle. '' He is an adversary of St. 
Paul," says Renan, in speaking of St. James. . . . 
One feels that he held a good deal on the law. An 
entire paragraph of his epistle (ii, 14, etc.) is devoted to 
warn the faithful against the doctrine of Paul, in regard 
to the uselessness of the good works and the salvation 
by faith. A phrase of James (ii, 24) is the direct nega- 
tion of a phrase in the Epistle to the Romans (iii, 28). 
In opposition with the Apostle of the Gentiles, the 
Apostle of Jerusalem maintains that Abraham was 
saved by his good works, that faith without good works 
is a dead faith. The demons have faith and apparently 
are not saved. Discarding here his habitual modera- 
tion, James calls his adversary a " vain man " (ii, 20, 
E. Renan Op. cit. p. 47, 55). 

The vain man of which James speaks is neither St. 
Paul nor another determined person, it is in general 
the one who is devoid of good works. The antagonism 
and the contradiction one supposes between the two 
apostles are imaginary. St. Paul, in the Epistle to the 



THE EPISTLE OF ST. JAMES. 619 

Romans and in the Epistle to the Galatians insists a 
good deal on the truth that faith saves, and not the 
good works. St. James, on the contrary, says that 
faith alone, without good works, does not save. Both 
are right and do not contradict themselves. The works 
of Avhich St. James speaks are not, indeed, those of 
which St. Paul speaks. The latter speaks of the works 
of the law, of the legal practices of the Jews, and he 
speaks very justly that the observance of the Jewish 
prescriptions does not justify without faith. St. James 
does not occupy himself with legal works, but 'with 
Christian works, which is quite different. The true 
religion, he says, does not consist only in believing, but 
in conforming his conduct to his faith, not in observing 
the law of Moses, but the law of God and of Jesus 
Christ. This doctrine is identical with that of St. 
Paul. St. James does not mention, among the oblig- 
atory works, the circumcision, the observance of the 
ritual prescriptions, etc., he enumerates exclusively the 
works of charity and of mercy (James i, 27). His epistle, 
addressed to the converted Jews, has for chief end, not 
to make them observe the Mosiac law, but, on the con- 
trary, to detach them from it in order to occupy them- 
selves exclusively with the observation of the moral 
precepts of the Gospel. 



CHAPTER LXVI. 



ST. PAUL'S EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 
THE AUTHOR OF THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 

THE authenticity of the thirteen Epistles of St. Paul 
was universally admitted during the eighteen 
centuries of the Church. It is not the same with the 
fourteenth and last, which is addressed to the^Hebrews. 
Its Paulinian origin has been a subject of discussion 
among the ancient ecclesiastical writers, and naturally 
the rationalistic criticism does not hesitate to maintain 
that the Epistle to the Hebrews is not of St. Paul. We 
will explain why the authority of this letter has been 
considered doubtful, and show at the same time that 
our Vulgate had reason to rank it among the epistles of 
this apostle. 

Each of the other thirteen Epistles of St. Paul bears his 
name. But the present epistle is without either name or 
address, and it omits also at the beginning the usual sal- 
utation. Thus it commences in the form of an essay 
though it closes in that of an epistle. These circum- 
stances in connection with its peculiar style and diction, 
and the peculiar range of the topics discussed in it, have 
produced a diversity of opinion on the question whether 
St. Paul was Its author. For the full discussion of the 
arguments on both sides the reader must be referred 
to the commentaries, some of which are accessible to all. 
(620) 



ST. PAUL'S EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 621 

Our limits will permit us to indicate certain facts and 
principles which have a bearing on the authorship of 
the epistle and its canonical authority. 

TESTIMONIES OR EXTRINSIC PROOF. 

We will not invoke here, as a great number of 
authors do, the words of St. Peter: " As also our most 
dear brother Paul . . . hath written to you " (2 
Pet. iii, 15), because these words do not appear to have 
this epistle for object. But inspired texts being want- 
ing, we can quote the testimony of the principal 
Churches of the Orient and Occident: i. In the Orient, 
we will quote first the opinion of the three patriarchal 
churches of Jerusalem, Antioch, and of Alexandria. 
That of the Church of Jerusalem is revealed to us by St. 
Cyril in a passage wherein he remarks that St. Paul 
alone has left fourteen epistles, that is, that he has writ- 
ten twice more than the other apostles together. To 
this testimony we can add that of Origen who belonged 
to the Church of Palestine as well as to that of Alexan- 
dria. At Antioch, the tradition was the same as that 
at Jerusalem. Besides, St. Crysostom who places 
the Epistle to the Hebrews in the same rank as the 
thirteen others who explains it to the faithful in the 
same manner, we can quote in its favor a letter ad- 
dressed (264) to Paul of Samosata, bishop of Antioch, 
through a certain number of bishops assembled in his 
episcopal city in order to judge him. In this letter the 
Epistle to the Hebrews is expressly attributed to St. 
Paul. 

At Alexandria, where the science of the Scriptures 
was zealously cultivated by both the Jews and the 
Christians, we behold a Doctor of the second century. 



622 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

probably St. Pantenus (Euseb. H. E. vi, 14), explain- 
ing why the apostle did not put his name to the Epistle 
to the Hebrews. About the end of the same century 
Clement of Alexandria seeks to explain the peculiari- 
ties which he remarks in its composition; but the embar- 
rassments he experiences in this regard do not hinder 
his quoting it under the name of St. Paul in eight 
places (Strom, vi, 8, 62, etc.). A little later, Origen 
discusses anew the same problem, without succeeding 
any better in the solution in regard to the authenticity 
of this epistle: non temere^ he says, majores hanc epis- 
tolam Pauli dixer unl (Ensth. H. E. vi, 25). In another 
place, he says that, if the fact were contested, it would 
be easy to prove it (Orig. Ep. ad iVfric. 9). Thus, in 
spite of the dif^culties they beheld in saying that this 
epistle had the same author as the thirteen others, they 
did not fail to firmly adhere to tradition, and their con- 
viction was immovable. For this reason, St. Athan- 
asius, drawing up, in 360, the hst of the unquestionably 
inspired books, in order to distinguish them from the 
apocryphal writings, which they tried to spread, enum- 
erates among the first the fourteen epistles of St. Paul, 
in placing that to the Hebrews, not at the end, but 
before the pastoral epistles. The most ancient manu- 
scripts we have, especially of Alexandrian origin, con- 
tain it equally. 

In order to appreciate this testimony of the Church 
of the Orient, it is good to observe: (a) That we could 
join to the patriarchal Churches other Churches of a 
great authority, for example, that of Csesarea repre- 
sented by Eusebius, St. Basil, and St. Gregory of 
Nazianz; and all those of Mesopotamia, whose opinion 
is known to us through St. James of Nisibis (Serm. ii, 



ST. PAUL'S EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 623 

13; viii, 3; xii, 7), St. Ephreni, and by the Peshito, the 
Syrian version, which always contained the Epistle to 
the Hebrews, (b) That all the Churches which we have 
quoted were not very distant from Judea, consequently, 
better able to know than many others the truth in 
regard to the Epistle to the Hebrews, (c) That they 
had in their midst men who were well known for both 
their knowledge and zeal for the purity of the faith; 
that several held opposite opinions in regard to cer- 
tain points, and consequently to watch one another; 
and that all beheld before them numerous Arians inter- 
ested to combat and to reject this epistle. 

When one keeps account of these observations, one 
will not hesitate to acknowledge as incontestable what 
is expressly affirmed by Eusebius (H. E. iii, 38 and vi, 
25) and St. Jerome (Ep. cxxix, 3), both the most 
learned men, and the best critics of Christian antiquity, 
that there is only one voice in the Orient to attest 
that the Epistle to the Hebrews is the work of St. Paul. 

2. In the Occident, the accord was not so complete 
or at least not so constant. In the first century, St. 
Clement had quoted this epistle as an inspired writing 
in- several places in his Epistle to the Corinthians, and 
one could hardly question that it had an apostle for 
author. In the second century St. Irenseus quoted it 
in a treatise which has not come to us, but yet without 
naming its author. In the third century, it was attrib- 
uted by Tertullian to St. Barnabas (Euseb. H. E. vi, 
20). The Muratorian canon attributes to the apostle 
only thirteen epistles; and Cajus, priest of Rome (d. 
220) counts no more in his writing against Proclus. 
But since the middle of the fourth century, which is 
the epoch of the great Doctors, they established that 



624 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

the doubts in regard to the authorship of this epistle 
were not founded, and all hesitation disappeared. After 
this we see the Epistle to the Hebrews quoted like 
the others. From the time of the letter of St. Innocent 
I to St. Exuperus (405), and even since the Council of 
Hippo (395), one draws no longer any difference be- 
tween this epistle and the others written by St. Paul. 
St. Jerome (d. 420) acknowledges that it is universally 
received in the Roman Church. 

CHARACTERS OF THE EPISTLE OR INTRINSIC PROOF. 

All the indications which this epistle furnishes refer 
its origin in the time of the apostles and designate St. 
Paul as its author. 

I. In the first place one recognizes that the author 
is a Jew, converted to Christianity, who wrote before 
the year yo A. D. He gives himself out as compatriot 
and contemporary of the Saviour (i, 1-2; xi, 2 etc.), and 
the picture he traces of the worship and of the legal 
ceremonies shows that in his time the Temple was yet 
erect, the sacrifices practiced and the ancient priesthood 
in honor (Cf. vii, 23, 2y; viii, 3-5, 13; i-io, 25; x, 1-3; 
xiii, 11-T3). A Uttle later the most of these consider- 
ations would have been superfluous: even they would 
not have presented themselves to the mind. How 
could the Christians have been tempted to return to 
Judaism? Why should they be afraid of being misled 
out of human respect? Why should they seek to 
detach themselves from their terrestrial country? To 
what use would it have been to refer to allegories and 
to mystic senses In order to justify the arrival of a new 
law and of a new priesthood? (xiii, 14; vii, 12; viii, 13). 
What should be the meaning, saying that there are 



ST. PAULAS EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 625 

no carnal sacrifices any longer, no more family of Aaron, 
no more Levitical tribe; finally, that the hour has 
arrived to offer all over to the Lord a spiritual worship 
and worthy of Him? The Fathers have not failed to 
dwell on these considerations. It is, therefore, man- 
ifest that the epistle is anterior to the year 70, as it is 
evident that the "Apologetic," and the treatises '' De 
Lapsis," have been written before the end of the perse- 
cutions. 

The uniform tenor of the epistle indicates, more- 
over, that those to whom it was addressed were Jewish 
Christians without any mixture of a Gentile element. 
The salutations at the end further imply that the epistle 
addresses no Hebrew Christians in general, but some 
particular community of them, w^hich is most naturally 
to be sought in Palestine, perhaps in Jerusalem. 

All these indications, which we could multiply, have 
certainly a great force. It seems incredible that an 
author of the first century, capable of composing such 
a writing, should have appropriated to such a point the 
doctrine and the manner of the Apostle of St. Paul, 
that he could have made himself pass for him or to be 
confounded with him. 

D. B.— 40 



CHAPTER LXVII. 



THE APOCALTPSE. 

THE Rationalists of our day are quite generally 
agreed on the authenticity of the Apocalypse, and 
attribute the same to the Apostle St. John. However, 
they are not satisfied with the Book of Revelations,- and 
endeavor to discredit its inspiration., Among the most 
plausible of the rationalistic critics, Renan adduces the 
following theories in his '' Antichrist: " 

At the time the Apocalypse was composed there 
remained only John of the apostles whom St. Paul 
called '' pillars " (Gal. ii, 9). '' It is certain that the two 
apostles, Peter and Paul, had died in 70. . . . James 
had died in 62." — These two affirmations are incor- 
rect, but the error does not delay to show itself. To 
prepare the reader for the conclusions one wishes to 
make him accept, St. John, contrary to all testimony 
of tradition, is represented to us as '' violent and fa- 
natic, the most hateful against Paul, extremely intoler- 
ant, etc." (see '' Antichrist," p. 327-329. Such is the 
picture which Renan has draw^n of the author. Be- 
hold how he manipulates the facts. 

St. John accompanied probably St. Peter in his 

voyage to Rome in the year (:f2. In ()y, during the 

martyrdom of Peter and Paul, John was condemned, 

after an ancient tradition, to be plunged alive into a 

(626) 



THE APOCALYPSE. 627 

kettle of boiling oil, on the spot which was called since 
Latin-Gate. He escaped death, and shortly afterwards 
he left Rome with several Christians and fled into Asia, 
to Ephesus. 

Renan admits for the need of his cause, some ac- 
counts of tradition as to St. John the Evangelist, but 
disfigures them after his usual custom. To explain 
some passages of the Apocalypse, Renan intimates that 
the author of the book must have seen with his own 
eyes, since the time of Nero, PozzuoH, Solfatara, and 
the corruption which reigned in these places of pleasure, 
frequented by the noble youth of the world's capital. 
Most of the testimonies refer the tortures of St. John 
to a much posterior date, but let us not insist on this. 
One is quite generally agreed that it took place in Asia 
about the year 65. 

According to Renan, the xA^pocalypse was written in 
Asia Minor between the lOth and the 14th of January 
in the year 69, and at the end of the month it was 
already known by seven churches. Indeed, St. John 
tells us that he composed the Revelations at Patmos 
(Apoc. i, 9), but the author of " Antichrist " does not 
admit this. Tradition also assures us that the apostle 
was exiled to this small island. This point is equally 
denied, because the Island of Patmos does not form 
part of the places of deportation which are known to us 
through the classical authors. But no one has left us 
a complete and official list of the islands of banishment, 
and what Suetonius (Tit. viii) tells of the motives 
which made them to be chosen in asperhnas insiilarum, 
agrees perfectly with the Island of Patmos. Renan's 
affirmation that the Apocalypse was written at Ephesus 
rests upon no foundation. 



628 DIFFICULTIES OF THE BIBLE. 

That what Renan writes of the date of the prophecy 
of vSt. John, and about the circumstances which caused 
him to pubhsh it, is no less exact than that what he says 
about the place where it was composed. To him the 
Apocalypse rests upon an error of fact, namely, that 
Nero had not yet died in the year 68; it foretells an 
event which did never realize itself, for it announces that 
Nero would reappear and resume the reins of the 
empire. False prophecy, for Nero had died indeed and 
did not reappear. 

The Apocalypse was not composed in the year 68 
or 69. No ancient author attributes to it this date; 
and what is more, Renan is unable to bring forward a 
single authority in his favor. All historic testimony is 
equally against him. '' The date of the Apocalypse," 
says M. Bullock, " is fixed by the great majority of 
the critics between the years 95 and 97. The imposing 
testimony of St. Irenssus (disciple of Papias and of St. 
Polycarp, disciples themselves of St. John the Evangel- 
ist), is almost alone sufficient to reject every other 
date. Eusebius reports also a tradition which he does 
not question at all, and according to which, under the 
persecution of Domitian, St. John, Apostle and Evangel- 
ist, lived yet, and was exiled on the island of Patmos, 
on account of the testimony he had rendered to the 
Divine Word. We see In the works of Clement of Alex- 
andria, and of Origen allusions in the same sense. No 
writer of the first three centuries is known that assigns 
to the Apocalypse another place or another date " 
(Revelation in Smith's " Dictionary of the Bible," vol. 
3, p. 1036). 



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